Signatures/seals for letters

[Kent]

I would like some mechanic to have a signature and/or a wax seal on a letter so as to prove it's authenticity.

Currently, some fraudster can write any letter and send it anonymously or show it to others with the Mercenary Commander's name printed at the bottom, or Rig Jarl Bjorn (sp?), or whomever, and no way to know who really wrote it.

A signature or a wax seal would be a mechanic to authenticate this.

Also, a mechanic to 'show' the letter to another player and they can read it in your hand, as an unscrupulous player could, if you give it to them to read, just walk away with your signed document or destroy it. Not mentioning any names (but J is the initial).

[Lae]

People might want to fool others Kent. People might want to RP. There should not be a mechanic for something put in for that very purpose. If you think someone is fooling with you, do something about it ICly. Don't ask for an ooc way to fix it.

[Lae]

P.S. you can replicate and or steal seals as well, you know.

[Avedri]

I'd like this just because it adds a layer of security when mailing stuff. Though envelopes would serve the same purpose to prevent someone from just sifting through letters which it seems NPC postpeople are oft to do. Speaking of which, a pox on the Arad mailing system for having such loose security!

[Jaster]

I'm gonna unscrupulously eat every letter you hand me. That's right.. eat. NOM NOM NOM!

[Fayne]

I thought you could read letters and such shown to you? At least, I'm pretty sure I had it happen to me at least once before.

Also, I think it's safe to say that if someone is mailing something anonymous, they wouldn't sign ut with their real name. That totally eliminates the purpose of mailing it anonymously, plus it costs more.

Maybe we could flip it around, so that it actually costs more to have the workers tell the recipient who sent it, and the default could be anonymous? After all, this would explain why people even bother signing letters, and this is sorta how real-world postal service works. All you need on a letter IRL that could identify the sender is the return address. Considering that having the postal workers state the sender means they have to keep track of both the recipient and sender, that sees like much more work than simply saying "yeah, somebody mailed you this. Enjoy."

[jilliana]

I did always wonder why something like seals and signatures weren't already available in the game. This is especially the case when in the time period CLOK is loosely based in, people did sign and seal their letters.

It would be nice to have envelopes and not just packages to place paper in.

It doesn't hurt to suggest things like this as it opens up more ideas even if the initial suggestion may not be the best. :)

[Kent]

P.S. you can replicate and or steal seals as well, you know.

Well, that's not child's play, that would take a skill (forging).

A stolen seal would be announced and a new seal drafted.

[Lysse]

P.S. you can replicate and or steal seals as well, you know.

Well, that's not child's play, that would take a skill (forging).

A stolen seal would be announced and a new seal drafted.

That would be my issue with this. You seem to want a 99% unbeatable way to stop people from doing illegitimate, mail-based activities. While it's cool on a coded level to have a seal/signet/etc., and it makes for a neat and shiny RP toy, it also stifles other avenues of roleplay by introducing a nearly insurmountable obstacle.

Unless, of course, it took several weeks to process the request for a new seal, and maybe cost a fair amount of tax to the official that takes care of it.

[Lae]

P.S. you can replicate and or steal seals as well, you know.

Well, that's not child's play, that would take a skill (forging).

A stolen seal would be announced and a new seal drafted.

That would be my issue with this. You seem to want a 99% unbeatable way to stop people from doing illegitimate, mail-based activities. While it's cool on a coded level to have a seal/signet/etc., and it makes for a neat and shiny RP toy, it also stifles other avenues of roleplay by introducing a nearly insurmountable obstacle.

Unless, of course, it took several weeks to process the request for a new seal, and maybe cost a fair amount of tax to the official that takes care of it.

^^ This, anonymous mail was implemented so that people do NOT have to announce themselves. This wasn't a problem for you until it involved you and that's when this thread started.

Why was it fine up until now?

[Rias]

What do you mean by "signatures"? I'm assuming you mean some special text added below the normal writable space or something that says 100% "This is from this specific individual." As others have mentioned, we don't want this 100% authentication to be possible. People should be able to do sneaky things.

Putting things in envelopes or placing seals could be neat, though. As mentioned, seals could believably be faked, forged, or copied in some situations.

[Fayne]

I don't like the idea of personal seals unless they are super crazy expensive. There was never a point in time where every Tom, Dick, and Larry who could read and write had their own personal wax seal. Those were things that only important and wealthy people had, and were not generally used unless the letter was of great importance or invilved official business. I think perhaps married characters could get s family seal to share, and induviduals could earn their own seal (or buy it if you're rich).

But honestly, I like my first idea better.Make the postal system completely anonymous, and either sign the letter or pay the guy extra to tell the recipient who the package is from.

[Elystole]

I'm kind of baffled that people are arguing about this. If you want proof that a letter is real, don't accept anonymous letters. If you read something suspicious, treat it as such.

What do you do when you receive an email from someone claiming to be from your bank?

[Avedri]

Kent is actually a nigerian prince, k?

[Alexander]

I would very much enjoy the possibility of a seal, for the sake of flavor alone.

[Alicia]

I love the idea of seals and especially the idea of stealing/forging them. For a long period of time signatures were not proof of identity even if they were on a letter, the wax seal near the signature or sealing the letter was the proof.

There could be several different ways to do it. First off I think it would cost a bit of riln to have a custom seal ordered (as most seals were a press with a design engraved) and require you to have a lit candle in the room and the letter and press in your hands of which you could then 'sign' or 'seal'. Signing the letter and sealing them would provide two different things. Signing it you could read the letter as often as you wanted and the wax seal remains in place, If you sealed the letter, the next time it was read the seal would be consumed and lost (thus by removing the authentication of letter)

A couple different ways to forge them. Of course, stealing the original press which could fool folks until the owner of said seal spread around the word that their old seal was compromised.

Creating a copy of the original. Get a hold of the original press and then with forging : general skill rolls make a cast of the press and then to forge a copy in the new mold with the possibility of having small flaws present depending on your skill that may or may not still fool those you're using the copied seal on (depending on how well the person looking at the seal actually knew the details of the original seal completely). Of course this can be a lot of fun because to pull it off not only do you have to get your hands on the press and make a copy of it before the owner knows, but then to keep the ruse up you have to get the press back into their position without them becoming suspicious!

Removing signatures/seals. Use of some sort of crafting/profession roll or something along those lines with a chisel and a candle in your hand to slowly melt just enough of the seal to scrape it off and yet it remain hard enough you can store it for later reapplication. Chances of: destroying the seal all together, smearing the details of the seal which can range from almost completely ruined to just a few minor flaws and successfully harvesting the seal.

To reuse your now stolen signature/seals another roll of some sort to apply it to the new letter without melting it too much or smearing the details of the seal's crest.