Identity in Aurbis is not a name floating over your head. It is what you choose to say of yourself, what others have learned to remember of you, and what stays hidden behind your hood. You may walk as a stranger, signing only by a description. You may become known. Both are choices, and the realm honors both.
How it works
Until someone has identified themselves to you, or you to them, they read in your chat as a chat id and a short description. A stranger. That is the social baseline of the province: nobody knows anybody by default.
/desc is what others see when they look at you, the short line under your name when they ask who you are. Set it, read it back, clear it, and change it as your character changes. The cap is 240 characters, and small intentional sentences serve better than autobiographies. You can read another person's description the same way, by their chat id or by the name you know them under.
/know is the other direction. When you have met someone and want to remember them by a name of your choosing, the cloaked figure in the Bee and Barb who said her name was Eira, or just the Stormcloak with the limp, record it and your chat shows that name where it used to show a chat id. /known reads the roster back. None of it is shared and none of it is public. Every character keeps their own private list of who they have come to know, and by what name.
Concealment is built. Wear an approved face covering, an Execution Hood, a Cultist Mask, a Shrouded Cowl, a Nightingale Hood or one of the masks the launcher installs with the rest of the modlist, and everyone sees you as a Masked Stranger with a four-digit number instead of whatever they knew you as. The number lasts only as long as the session and a new one is drawn every time you cover your face again, so being seen masked twice is not the same as being recognised. Putting the item on is what does it. /mask only tells you where you stand, and taking the mask off restores whatever each person knew you as before.
Overhead identity plates follow the same rules, and /names turns them off if you would rather read the world without them.
Commands (/help identity)
/desc reads back your current character description./desc [text] sets your own description. Maximum 240 characters./desc set <text> sets it explicitly./desc <chat-id or known name> reads somebody else's description./desc clear clears yours./know <chat id> <custom-name> records a custom known identity for a nearby player./known [name-fragment] lists the identities your character has recorded. The fragment filters the list./mask shows whether your face is concealed and your current masked stranger id./names shows, hides or toggles the overhead identity plates. This one is handled by your client.
This is the player side of the information economy. Books, letters and literacy live in Literacy, Scribes, and Written Works.
