I think the word ethics can only be very loosely used here. Ethics and morals have this connotation of something good, but when it comes to a game, what's good online isn't always going to be conventionally good in real life. Look at all those games that let you pick an evil alignment or play as a thief, a necromancer, etc.
Putting aside all the good/bad connotations, the basic "ethics" of a game are firstly going to be defined by the game's built-in constraints. So if ganking, spying, ganging up, constant attacking etc are allowed by the software code, then they are "ethical".
"Ethics" will be secondarily defined by the rules put in place by the admin. So when the admin says that botting, flaming, spamming etc are illegal, they become "unethical" by definition.
The third definition of "ethics" in a game is going to come from the players, which is where I think a lot of people are getting hang-ups. When what a player views as "ethical" clashes with the first or second definitions, that's when you get people complaining that they are being harassed by bigger players, constant attacks, etc, and it's ALSO when you get people complaining that there is nothing wrong with them botting to feed their armies. Along with the reverse viewpoints and the whole debate.
Whether you think ethics have a place on Evony or not is going to depend on how well your own definition reconciles with the definitions imposed by the code and the admin. The debate will be stuck at player level until the Evony devs step in and change something in the first two definitions. This is just my point of view as someone who's actually worked on developing other games and enforcing the rules on some of them. I vote other.



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