Honour

Honour is a style of gameplay adopted by certain clans as a means of ensuring fairness during an engagement with an adversary.

The Wilderness Guardians have always maintained a code of honour.

Universal Code of Honour

Historically, a clan was considered honourable if they would abide by a set of de-facto rules of gameplay known as the Honour Code. In the early years of RuneScape the vast majority of clans upheld the code, though over time more and more clans which chose not to were established and deemed No-Honour or NH. The code itself is a gentleman's agreement, and elements were subject to the preferences of the entire clan world, with many clans having their own interpretation. The code itself also adapted over the years as aspects which once were considered dishonourable became overwhelmingly common, such as a player dying during a fight, re-gearing and returning to the battle.

Modern Aspects

As a general rule of thumb, clans considered honourable will generally avoid taking part in the following:

• Breaking Terms of War - the act of disobeying any pre-determined fight rules such as boundaries, gear and items.
• Law and Rule-Breaking - the act of breaking Jagex's code of conduct (such as hacking enemy players' accounts), or breaking real-world laws (such as leaking enemy players' personal information (doxing) or orchestrating Denial of Service attacks (DDoSing))
• Spying - the act of sending a player to join a rival clan solely to feed or leak information and intelligence.
• Welfaring/Ragging - the act of fighting in cheap gear such as just black dragonhides, or one-iteming.

Debatable Aspects

There is currently no consensus on whether taking part in the following is dishonourable or not:

• Flaming - the act of verbally abusing an opponent in-game in an attempt to demoralise them. While still considered somewhat dishonourable, this has become overwhelmingly common between clans in Old-School RuneScape, with almost every active clan engaging in it.
• Multiclanning - the act of a single player joining multiple clans at once. While many clans still retain rules against multiclanning, the prominence of teams and the blurring of the distinction between teams and clans makes this somewhat difficult to enforce.
• Camping - the act of targetting and constantly attacking a single player as often as possible. This is sometimes considered player harrasment by Jagex, but occurs frequently in multi-combat fights without consequence.

Defunct Aspects

Historical and now-redundant aspects of the honour code included avoiding taking part in the following:

• RPKing - the act of attacking players in the Wilderness who are not there for PvP, such as PvMers, skillers and clue hunters. Over the years it has become increasingly common for clans to simply attack any non-friendly player on sight.
• Object Hugging - the act of maneuvering around in-game furniture to avoid an enemy's attacks. Hugging was a tactic developed by the more innovative clans around 2004, and many spoke out against it. Within 6 months of RuneScape 2's release, almost every clan was using this tactic and it has since become a staple for multi PvP.
• Returning - the act of a player dying during a fight, re-gearing, and returning to continue fighting. This was popularised by Damage Incoporated in 2005, and has since become an essential part of both planned and unplanned fights.
• Dragging - the act of running away from the main battle when under attack. This does not include breaking the boundaries of a planned fight, which would come under breaking the Terms of War. Dragging was popularised by Dark Slayers.
• Account Sharing - the act of sharing account(s) between multiple players within a clan, which was formerly against the RuneScape rules. This was pioneered by several clans including Adelais and initially recieved backlash, but has since become common with Jagex turning a blind eye to it and its overwhelming usefulness in aspects such as the Deadman tournaments.
• Single Hugging - the act of attacking an enemy in a multi-combat zone from within a single-combat zone, reducing the enemy's ability to retaliate to effectively none. Historically, most clans fought between Annakarl and the giant spider hill in deep Wilderness, and fleeing to a single-combat zone was considered retreating and dishonourable. This has since become a popular tactic, notably at the entrance of the Revenant Caves.
• Retreating and Teleporting - the act of ending a fight by either running to a single or safe zone, or teleporting out. Honourable clans were expected to fight to the death, but most clans now choose to leave when overwhelmed and try avoid having their members take a final death. Teleporting out is especially common in the Revenant Caves.
• Sniping - the act of one player or group of players choosing to attack other targets other than their clan's main pile. If the entire clan did not have a pile, it was considered "mass-sniping". This was originally considered annoying and frowned upon, though sniper caps started to be introduced in planned fights, and it has since become a legitimate tactic.
• Crashing - the act of engaging with two or more clans already in battle. Interrupting a fight was originally considered dishonourable, but eventually started to apply only to planned fights rather than run-ins. Today, many clans will often call their allies to aid them in a fight.

WG Honour Code

The Honour Code (or Code of Honour) of the Wilderness Guardians in effect today contains the following provisions:

• Guardians must not verbally abuse another player (Flaming)
• This clan will enver crash a planned fight (Crashing)
• We do not spy on other clans (Spying)
• Guardians must adhere to the agreed rules of a planned fight (Breaking Terms of War)
• Guardians must not flee a battle (Retreating)
• All members must wear appropriate PKing equipment (Welfaring/Ragging)

There are also two optional provisions, which members are not required to follow:

• We do not kill non-PKers in the wilderness (ARPKing)
• Share loot from your kills (Splitting)

Historical Codes

The original Honour Code of WG was combined with the general clan rules, in a document titled The Rules and Beliefs of the Wilderness Guardians (shortened to Adopted Clan Rules & Belifs). It was outlined on the clan's AvidGamers Website and contained 7 provisions:

• Rule 1 on ARPKing, which prohibited members killing unskulled players.
• Rule 2 which prohibited multiclanning, with the exception of Clan Representatives.
• Rule 3 which prohibited disobeying orders from members of a higher rank.
• Rule 4 which prohibited scamming.
• Rule 5 which outlined the right to voice opinions, but prohibited swearing, racism, sexism, discrimination, insulting individual(s), irrelevant content, advertising and adult material.
• Rule 6 which prohibited hacking RuneScape-related websites.
• Rule 7 which prohibited breaking the RuneScape rules.