HavenRPG is an amazing experience... for the first month or two.

I very much enjoyed the oppressive feeling of the dark roleplay there, the sense of mystery to just about everything. And uncovering the dark, often horrifying secrets behind the game is an experience.

Unfortunately, once you get powerful enough to put you on the radar of people who want to 'win' the game at all costs, all bets are off. For example, they have something called the mantle of the tyrant. People are protected from things like permadeath or rape, under most conditions. The mantle of the tyrant allows him to bypass those conditions, and having that sort of thing in the hands of a player who wants to win at all costs ends up as you expect.

A single player, intent on winning, has killed, mind controlled, and otherwise run off most of the game. I use the word 'run off', not run, or have any sort of power except to grief people. When he has been threatened with defeat by story (admin-controlled) characters, he has turned story off, preventing defeat by those realms. The OOC forums are rife with people 'memeing' extremely negative and toxic things about other people.

If other games are cautionary tales about what happens when staff gets too much power, let this one be a cautionary tale about what happens when the wrong sorts of players do.