Goblin Squad Member
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I know there has been more than one thread on this subject, but this thread is about a VERY specific issue. Alignment in concerns to player interaction. First off as many of you may already know PFO is not the first game to do this. I have used four such systems:
Darkfall (System 1)
Darkfall (System 2)
Mortal Online
EVE
I'm going to give a brief overview of each system except EVE. There aren't many relavant issues to it that the other three don't cover, and I am least familiar with it. I will cover what I liked about them and what was wrong with it them.
Darkfall (System 1)
Darkfall's first system was very basic. Players from friendly races who were lawful were blue. Enemy races and unlawful players were red. Alignment went from 10 to -100. Anything above 0 was lawful everything else was unlawful. Unlawful players were not allowed in starting towns. Green players are clan members and allies, and nothing you do to them changes your alignment. Orange players were war targets and your actions against them also did nothing to your alignment.
Attacking a blue player turned you grey, or "criminal." Grey status works exactly like red status but it wears off. It lasted 10 seconds if you attack once, and two minutes if you attack twice. It also went away when you died. If you killed (incapacitate and cause to start bleeding out) a blue player you got -8 alignment unless they chose to forgive you, which they could do at any point before they bled out. If you proceeded to "gank" that character, causing them to bleed out instantly, then you got an additional -2 with no chance of forgiveness. Killing a red player always gave you +2 alignment.
What I liked about this system:
1. It took me awhile to find a single positive for this system but... The forgiveness feature was a nice, if not perfect. It was very handy if you died by friendly fire, or if the person who killed you chose to revive you. However if you were ganked by someone else too quickly, you got killed by decapitation, (An-insta gank received when you are hit by a powerful melee blow at very low health) you died in water, (Also an insta-gank from "drowning") or you simply clicked "No" by mistake (As a party member did to me once.) you could end up not forgiving someone you wanted to forgive.
What I did not like about this system:
1.It was too easy for to lose blue status. A single kill and gank and you were red. Two kills and no ganks and you are also red. Even if you have never done anything unlawful before, and have been doing lawful actions for years. This is a problem because there were some times you really needed to kill griefers who were blue, and accidents happen.
2. Grey status abuse. Sometimes players would attack another player once and go grey. That player would start fighting them, and the ten seconds would expire making them blue again. Then THEY would go grey, and the first player would kill them. This was commonly used to grief new players who didn't know better.
3. Blue blocking. This is where blues would run along with red players or war targets. Jumping in front of them so that poorly aimed attacks and area of effect attacks hit them, causing the player that did it to go criminal. In and near towns, that could be fatal. This was ALSO used by blue players at NPC spawns. They would stand by NPCs, get hit, and then kill the criminal flagged player.
4. Alignment was meaningless / too easy to regain. Players would easily regain all their alignment by spawn camping reds, killing red alts that didn't formally belong to their alliance, or slaughtering newbs near enemy starter towns. Ironically the only people it really hurt were the newbs themselves, who couldn't find kills as easily if something caused them to go red.
5. Wars made being blue meaningless. Griefer clans would declare war on EVERY clan they encountered. If you were blue and in a clan you would still be slaughtered right inside the safe areas, for no alignment loss.
6. Fake clan invitations. "Welcome to the clan! Here's a kill. Here's a gank. And I didn't lose any alignment!"
7. Horse griefing. Mount ownership was not tracked unless there was a rider on top of it. The second you dismounted a sly horse thief could hop on and ride off, without being marked as a criminal or losing alignment. They could also kill your mount without losing alignment even if you were mounted. They would be marked grey but vets still did this to newbs sometimes.
8. No red self defense. If you killed a blue in self defense you still lost -8 alignment, which was a problem for anyone who accidentally went red.
9. Sieges and defending your town. Blues could take part in the fighting at sieges on either side. You may go red defending your city against blues, or if the griefers you are attacking bring un-clanned blues to defend.
Darkfall (System 2)
Darkfall released this system a year or two ago after they realized their first system was a disaster. The changes made were:
You could no longer gain alignment by killing player. Instead you could gain 2 alignment each day by donating 2000 gold to a shrine in a chaos city (A city anyone is allowed to use with no NPC protection.)
Large parts of the map were made "unlawful." Everyone in unlawful areas were marked grey effectively making alignment meaningless there. You were also marked grey if you entered the city of a non-allied clan.
Wars were changed so that you could only declare one a day, and they would only last a week before you had to renew them. Declarations and renewals each cost 2000 gold.
What I liked about this system:
1. The forgiveness system was still nice....
2. Losing alignment was a bigger deal.
3. You could no longer go red defending your own city.
What I didn't like about this system:
Only problems 4, 5, and 9 were addressed at all. 1 and 8 became far WORSE problems. 5 was only partially addressed. Griefer clans targeted the largest newb clans in the game and made war against them. This killed off some of the most promising new clans. 9 wasn't fully addressed in that defending griefer clans could bring blues to help. In fact it was even worse as it was now difficult or impossible to declare war on every defending clan because of the partial solution to 5. 4 was too well addressed. It was so hard to regain blue status that most people who went red, even if by accident, stayed red. Mainly because of problem 8. Almost all veterans other than griefers were red. Many griefers stayed blue so they could attack blue war targets in starter towns, which the veterans who might have helped couldn't access.
Mortal Online
Like Darkfall there are blue players who are lawful, red who are unlawful, and grey who are criminals / temporarily unlawful. You go grey for attacking blues, and lose alignment for killing them. There were important differences though.
In Mortal Online if you attack someone before they attack you, you are marked grey to them, even if they are grey or red. It is a special kind of grey that only they can see, allowing red players to fight back in self defense without losing alignment. I believe their clan members can help them as well.
Alignment isn't earned. You just get lawful points each hour. The rate at which you gain then is far slower than the average random player killer loses them. There is no limit on how far into the negative you can go.
Also everyone who did damage to a player before they died lost alignment. Not just the person who laid the killing blow like in Darkfall.
Mortal Online did have a war system. Each clan could only have one non-mutual war at a time, and unlimited mutual wars.
There was a thieving system... But that is a whole topic in itself.
What I liked about this system:
1. Being blue was meaningful. It was hard for an avid Random Player Killer to stay blue. And pretty easy for most players who actually were lawful.
2. Wars were more under control. There was LESS instances of vet clans bullying around newb clans because their war declaration slot was generally better used for someone else.
3. Reds could redeem themselves. With self defense allowed. All reds had to do is stop attacking blues and they would eventually go blue themselves.
What I didn't like about this system:
1. Suicide griefers. If you accidentally hit someone and they killed themselves, you would lose alignment as if you killed them.
2. Wars were still used for griefing. They were more under control than in Darkfall or EVE but any non-mutual war system which allows killing without alignment loss and attacking in safe areas ALWAYS is used to grief newb clans by someone.
3. Some reds got in too deep. With no cap on negative alignment, some reds could NEVER become blue again short of playing in a lawful manner for months or years of in-game time.
4. AFK lawful point recharging. Some people went inside their player owned house and went afk to get back their lawful status.
5. Pushing it as far as they could... A lot of blues would kill and rob someone every time they reached max alignment.
Tomorrow I will start on how these issues are related to PFO, which ones GW has already addressed, which ones I think they might run into, and how to address those issues. In the meantime I'll open this up for commentary, because I need some damn sleep.
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Goblin Squad Member
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That's awesome to get a summary like that Andius, thank you.
I was looking at EvE's system (Flags in detail) there's a lot of nuance in that system: A few minutes structure I could come up with:
- Combat action dependent on area and target (and direct indirect actions)
- Decoupling actions from consequences (ie action -> flag -> consequence)
- Different consequences dependent on area and target
=
I have a shaky grasp on the alignment system but Lee Hammock's post here really helped me understand it the most so far, it may be useful (& already known to you): Lee Hammock: The value of an alignment
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Goblin Squad Member
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Andius let me ask you this. What would you prefer? An aglinment systen that took very little time to change aglinment 1 or two hours to reach any aglignment you want or a very long time 1 to 2 weeks to change from neutrall to LN CN NE NG, and 3 to 4 weeks to reach LG CG LE LG?
In any system I think chaotic evil should be reachable from fully lawful good in a single day or hour, but it shouldn't be an "Oops I just went evil on accident" kind of thing. It should basically require you burn down a church with the whole screaming village inside, and shoot them as they try to break through the boarded windows. Not literally but you get the idea, a horrible and unspeakable act of mass slaughtering and destruction very deliberately done. Not a "But he was a lawful-good griefer!" or "Oops, finger slipped" kind of thing. That kind of stuff should ding you, but be something you can recover from pretty easily.
I would think going from fully chaotic evil to fully lawful good on the other hand, should take a week of in-game time where you are working fairly diligently at redemption, and not partaking in evil or chaos. So there would be either a hard or soft cap on just how evil you could be, that wouldn't allow you to make yourself practically unredeemable.
Anyway I think the a lot of my concerns are addressed by Goblinworks saying the will be banning griefers. A lot of the issues like blue blocking will be difficult to stop mechanically but CLEARLY are griefing and abuse of game mechanics, and are easy to identify by admins if a pattern develops.
There are a few concerns I still have though:
1. Alignment farming. Lee Hammock has stated killing criminals will increase your alignment as it did in Darkfall System 1. Because of this there needs to be safeguards that discourage camping criminal player and farming alt for alignment. I would attack this problem from three angles. First, only allow each person to gain alignment off of any other specific player once a day. Second, set a daily or hourly cap on alignment gained through PVP. (But no such cap on alignment list) Finally anyone found still trying to exploit the system should be made fully chaotic evil and find themselves unable to raise that alignment until the admins see fit.
2. The forgiveness feature. First we should have it. Secondly it should be done differently. Rather than a mid-game pop up you should have a menu showing each time you have been killed in the last 24 hours. This should be the menu from which you can forgive your killer, set a bounty on them, etc.
3. Wars. No non-mutual wars between companies that don't have opposing good/evil alignments. Period. The potential for abuse far outweighs any benefits.
4. Grey status abuse. Attacking a player once shouldn't flag you unless you bring them below 75% health, but getting marked grey should last until you have been out of combat for two minutes. Anyone caught still trying to abuse these mechanics should have thier alignment reduced to fully chaotic evil, and face a potential ban.
5. Fake clan invitations. This offense should earn a minimum of a 24-hour ban, alignment reduction, and deletion of the culprit's equipment, inventory, and maybe even bank.
6. Horse griefing. Mounts should be bound to their owner even after they dismount. Trying to mount or lead someone else's mount should result in a criminal flag and loss of alignment if that player was not of an opposing alignment. There should of course be a ownership transfer / and usage permissions option attached to mounts because of this. Killing mounts should also prompt a loss of alignment. As per usual, admins should deal harshly with any abuses.
7. Sieges. No alignment should be gained or lost anywhere in the area of a battle over a settlement or structure if you have declared support for either side of the siege (And your support was accepted.) Declaring a siege should effect the alignment of your organization if you aren't at war though.
8. Red self defense. Attacking a red should flag you to them, their company/kingdom, and their party members, allowing them to kill you without alignment loss. To be clear, this is if YOU initiate the confrontation. Not if you get jumped and start fighting back, or jump in to help another blue who's under attack. So whoever makes the first attack gets flagged. You can guess what I'll say about any abuse of this feature...
9. Suicide griefing. Alignment is only lost if the killing blow us made by you, a company/kingdom member, or a party member after you make a successful attack. Abuse... blah blah blah.
10. Afk lawful point recharging. All alignment gain should be tied to actions such as killing evil NPCs and players, donating to churches, running missions etc. Being lawful good should be a consistent pattern of behavior. Not the absence of evil and chaotic actions. You know the rest.
11. Pushing the envelope. There is no great system for preventing this, and it may be neutral roleplay as much as intentional abuse. The only suggestion I can give is reward people for sticking to their alignment, and perhaps require penance to be paid for chaotic and evil actions in order to be fully lawful good. With a cap on how much required penance you can build up of course.
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Goblin Squad Member
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3. No non-mutual wars? If this point is about stopping abuse of alignment, I'd say allowing the abuse is better than making it impossible for two settlements to fight just because they're both "good". Taking out all the political intrigue and vying for power. If you're truly "good", then maybe this does make some sense, but stopping neutral companies from attacking whoever they want, nevermind evil companies, is very anathema to politics and very story breaking.
And back to the "good" companies: doing this will make the lawful good companies seem so much less crazy zealot. So much. It will be embarrassing to be a paladin under these kinds of restrictions.
5. I have no idea what a "fake" clan invitation is, or why it is of grave concern regarding abusing alignment.
6. Depends how GW decides to handle mounts. If, like many other games, they function like an inventory item, just treat them like any other possession, and their theft like any other theft.
10. Lawful good may not be simply the absence of chaotic evil acts, but there is an argument to be made that true neutral is. Not that I want to see alignment recharging, but from a logical point of view of the case you are making that point just stands out to me.
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Goblin Squad Member
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3. No non-mutual wars? If this point is about stopping abuse of alignment, I'd say allowing the abuse is better than making it impossible for two settlements to fight just because they're both "good". Taking out all the political intrigue and vying for power. If you're truly "good", then maybe this does make some sense, but stopping neutral companies from attacking whoever they want, nevermind evil companies, is very anathema to politics and very story breaking.
And back to the "good" companies: doing this will make the lawful good companies seem so much less crazy zealot. So much. It will be embarrassing to be a paladin under these kinds of restrictions.
Wars are thee most consistently abused mechanic in every Open World PVP game I have ever played. I would go so far to say 90% of their usage is abuse of newb clans. 9% of 10% of valid usage of this system is based off combating those responsible for the 90%.
It goes like this. Clans come in, start up the game, and immediately receive a war declaration from a "lawful good" griefer clan, who proceed to stop them inside and outside of town without any consequences. Many, many, promising new clans end up dissolving because of abuse of war mechanics.
Unless you can find away of stopping that, I think the benefits are far outweighed by the negatives. I would go so far to say that any alignment system at all is meaningless unless THIS issue is dealt with. ALL of the WORST griefers I have ever encountered are good aligned because of this system. Based on my experience with it, I say trash the whole system. It isn't worth the trouble.
5. I have no idea what a "fake" clan invitation is, or why it is of grave concern regarding abusing alignment.
Fake clan invitations: "Welcome to the clan! Here's a kill. Here's a gank. And I didn't lose any alignment!"
It's inviting someone to a clan purely to kill them without alignment loss, and one of the most clear-cut cases of abuse of game mechanics, which is why it should be dealt with so harshly. Making an example out of the people who are caught in the most clear cut cases of griefing is a way to make people afraid to push the envelope too much.
10. Lawful good may not be simply the absence of chaotic evil acts, but there is an argument to be made that true neutral is. Not that I want to see alignment recharging, but from a logical point of view of the case you are making that point just stands out to me.
I see your point, but I'm sure you see mine too. Feel free to make an alternate suggestion.
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Goblin Squad Member
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6. I don't mind the criminal flag being used on someone attempting to steal/kill a mount when you are riding or leading it. But if you leave it reigned out the front of some wilderness area, I have reservations. If I am playing an assassin and trying to sneak up on you to take unholy vengeance on you for some reason, you can bet I'm going to make sure your transport is disabled (led away or killed).
Maybe a delayed timer on the criminal flag or any alerts being sent out? Give me some time to sneak up on you and stab you in the back before your dead horse magically tells you someone is skulking around.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Ah yes, an alignment discussion, or as I like to call it, the Curse of Gary Gygax.
One thing that I think is being missed wide here is that chaos/lawful and good/evil are two separate axis. So far i have seen it being tretead like a single range.
Lawful Good---------Nuetral------------Chaotic Evil.
I suggest if for simplicity's sake that's what your dealing with then just throw out one axis and call it Lawful-Nuetral-Chaotic.
If you actually want to use the full nine tic tac toe chart, then you have to choose which actions affect you on the lawful-chaos scale and which ones go on the good-evil scale.
Example: Killing a player in a nuetral area is Chaotic, you are breaking the law but who knows what your motive is. Using poison or engaging in assassination contracts can be evil.
Otherwise you are further muddling an already convoluted system.
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Goblin Squad Member
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3. so we have a system that is being abused, and I see the case you are making for how it can be abused. Punishing everyone doesn't seem like a fitting soultion for a game where the goal is to have that kind of meaningful interaction. Most guilds are going to go for neutral or good which means the "might" of any given nation will mostly be about who got there first.
And it still makes no sense at all regarding evil companies, and only sort of regarding neutral companies. All the alignment abuses you suggest are not abuses if you're supposed to be evil.
I suggest an alternative:
1) make wars have clearly defined objectives, and make declaring wars cause an alignment shift. If your company is good, you'll have to work as a company to shift your alignment back that way, to offset the shift. And a war cannot proceed if the objectives are met. If a company is forced to declare their objectives, then just using a war as an excuse to attack other players will be transparent if they are not working towards those objectives. If an abuse of alignment is suspected, a declaration makes it easier for mods to deal with. If your company meats its objectives, the declaration of war ends.
2) grace period wherein a new company cannot have a war declared against them.
3) wars can only be declared against settlements, not companies. You can't declare war on a group that does not control any land to war over. This one would seem to need refining though for coping with bandit and assassin clans who by their nature do not have political boundaries, but whatever loopholes you make to target outlaw companies, rather than just the outlaw tag on individual characters, people will get around by dissolving and reforming companies.
@Jiminy don't use an assassin's behavior as an example of why the criminal flag doesn't fit - it just cheapens the experience for us all ;)
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Goblin Squad Member
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@Jiminy don't use an assassin's behavior as an example of why the criminal flag doesn't fit - it just cheapens the experience for us all ;)
Okay okay!
My pragmatic cleric of justice is hunting down a dangerous heretic and discovers your horse tied up in front of an inn...
Same conclusion:)
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Goblin Squad Member
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Oh, I completely agree with you there. My comment of 'same conclusion' was around my reasoning as to why the criminal flag should not be automatic/instant when killing a lone mount.
I'll add another example, which just makes the issue even cloudier, but shows why I don't think this flag should be set. Bob the Bounty Hunter corners the most fearsome mass murderer in the River Kingdoms. He is notoriously slippery and has vanished into thin air a number of times in the past after being cornered. Bob find his mount tied up in front of one of his secluded safe houses. Leaving it there leaves a risk of the killer having access to fast transport and escaping yet again. Easy solution 'for the greater good' is to hamstring the horse and continue on with capturing the badguy.
All these examples go towards the post by avari3 above also. Alignment is a matrix, not a straight line. Sometimes people perform acts that seem evil to some, but are not in their own eyes and can be part of the greater good. Law and Chaos is even more interesting. The laws of one country might seem oppressive and horrid to another...if you refuse to follow them, are you no longer being lawful? I've heard the Chelaxians have a law that states people wearing white after labor day are outlaws.
Goblinworks Executive Founder
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The way I see it, if one settlement declares war on another settlement, all of the members of the declaring settlement become banned from 'Swiss' territory. (I'm deliberately not using 'neutral' because of the more specific meaning.)
Or perhaps you aren't banned from entering the city, but you still get the law's attention when you kill a Capulet within city limits, just like you would in the absence of a war.
Or you could allow a settlement to surrender, ending a war at some significant cost; in the worst case it would be loss of control of the settlement. The nation could even make promising terms of surrender: the same people are in charge of the settlement, but the settlement now belongs to the nation, subject to the national taxes and now immune to declarations of war that don't include the nation. Allow the ruler (or a revolting population—an issue unto itself) of the settlement to break from the nation (as when the nation is at war, and the settlement wants to join with the attacker or a third party or declare neutrality) and we have interesting emergent behavior on a new scale.
I could see a lot of national wars which center around getting one or more settlements to switch fealty. The basic mechanism would be proving "We can and will mess with you and your feudal master can't stop us, but if you join us we can stop him from messing with you."
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Goblin Squad Member
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The laws of one country might seem oppressive and horrid to another...if you refuse to follow them, are you no longer being lawful? I've heard the Chelaxians have a law that states people wearing white after labor day
There are no differing perspectives of alignment in PFO, alignment is a definition.
There are lawful acts
there are chaotic acts
there are good acts
there are evil acts
and finally there are neutral acts
An act may be a combination of these things, but it doesn't matter who is doing them, the act will always end in the same alignment direction shift. The magnitude will be based on your current alignment, something that goes strongly against your alignments, will cause a greater shift.
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Goblin Squad Member
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The laws of one country might seem oppressive and horrid to another...if you refuse to follow them, are you no longer being lawful? I've heard the Chelaxians have a law that states people wearing white after labor dayThere are no differing perspectives of alignment in PFO, alignment is a definition.
There are lawful acts
there are chaotic acts
there are good acts
there are evil acts
and finally there are neutral actsAn act may be a combination of these things, but it doesn't matter who is doing them, the act will always end in the same alignment direction shift. The magnitude will be based on your current alignment, something that goes strongly against your alignments, will cause a greater shift.
Yes, given this is not a TT game that is administered on a small ratio basis, I can fully understand why this is the way PFO goes.
I still want to be able to steal/kill a mount and be able to get away with it for some period of time though :)
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Goblin Squad Member
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10. Lawful good may not be simply the absence of chaotic evil acts, but there is an argument to be made that true neutral is. Not that I want to see alignment recharging, but from a logical point of view of the case you are making that point just stands out to me.I see your point, but I'm sure you see mine too. Feel free to make an alternate suggestion.
Andius, your suggestion that being Lawful Good be a consistent pattern of action spoke to me after long considering this new 'Alignment System' that I'm going to have to get used to. It seems immersive.
Alignment Drift
What if all alignments gradually drifted towards neutral? That would make it so LG characters would have to continue doing LG acts and they wouldn't have any incentive to commit an unlawful act when they were at the cap (numbers 10 and 11 on your list).
Maybe LG drifts to neutral faster than CE (to make CE acts more punishing). Alternatively, alignment could be capped earlier for LG than CE (ex: 100 to -500) so that a 'very CE' character would take much longer to reach neutral than an LG character. I think the latter is probably more 'fair'.
@Decius
Alright, you've convinced me. I want the level of intrigue that surrender mechanics and civil wars can bring.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I'm slightly confused by alignment use for pvp. For example, necromancy is an evil act, but if you're in a nation of necromancers, necromancy could easily make you lawful evil- and you don't ever have to murder someone. But I can't help thinking of it like the uo karma system.
I suppose I just think criminal acts and good/evil are not necessarily related. If we're talking about "unlawful killing" ie killing an innocent, or murder, yes it is an evil act, but in my opinion that's not relevant - it is a criminal act and that is what it should be flagged for.
But I suppose the real discussion is actually how do you deal with griefing, murder and the abuse of in game mechanics.
My suggestions are as follows;
Inter guild warfare:
I think for the purpose of game mechanics it should be a mutual system- both sides must declare war for full open world combat without penalty, however
If one side declares war, then any in that guild within territory owned by those declaring war may be attacked, but not outside territory they control.
Perhaps there should be a timer on this of a week or so that will turn it off again in a week if the war does not become mutual. Just a suggestion.
For individuals committing murder, the only system I can think of is the uo murder count system where the victim gives them a murder count and they are worked of by time and penalties like tithes or some such, a murderer is therefore flagged as such and becomes "kill on sight" to all. I also like uo's fame/karma reputation system for an indicator. Perhaps with a "murderer" title in there too. It's not perfect, but I can't think of a better way. If someone else can, good! Perhaps it could be refined so that dependent on your actions the hostility and rapidity of response to your criminal acts varies. If you regularly murder people, even if you work them off, you're a serial offender and perhaps npc guards will keep a closer eye on you in their territory, responding more rapidly the more trouble you cause in their territory, to the point where they practically drop out of the sky on you if you so much as take a swing at someone.
Player controlled factional towns should also be able to hire npc guards for the same purpose for similar effect. Their rules could be tweaked according to the desires of the owners. That should for the most part deal with random murderers, as long as things like aggressor timers don't drop out during combat and don't switch! Perhaps even pursue them beyond their territory, or perhaps the hiring of nps that hunt form players who committed crimes in a territory which will chase them within a certain range of a guild territory
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Goblin Squad Member
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@Jameow
The meaningful shift, in relation to countering griefing, is not the evil one, it's the chaotic shift. Your alignment affects the alignment of all organizations you are a part of. It is looking like chaotic settlements and players will be suffering more costs associated with civilization. There will be buildings in player settlements required for training advanced skills, access to these building will be far higher for chaotic players. GW is going to make it so living chaotically costs much more, and basically bars you from lawful society.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I don't really think alignment is the best determining factor for warfare and combat. More likely two cities or guilds fighting over a resource they believe they have a right to, fighting over an insult, over the breaking of an alliance, politics driven, not alignment driven. It's more likely that lawful and neutral factions would fight with each other than all against the chaotic.
I can't work out in my head a way to mechanically get to neutral chaotic or chaotic good. Killing evil characters unprovoked? Stealing from hitler?
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Goblin Squad Member
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So Evil players, are at a disadvantage?
So if everyone plays LG, I know they will not, but if they did,
What PVP would happen?Seems the devs are betting on groups of roaming bands to make content, if they do not show then what?
If the fees to be evil are too great where do these bands come from?
Lee
In every Open World PVP game I have played there is a minority of griefers. Players who specialize in ruining the experience of other players.
The MAJORITY are Random Player Killers. Groups to whom "noots" or neutral players are treated as enemies. "If it isn't blue(allied) it's dead!!!"
To a TINY minority of players, you don't kill anyone unless you have a reason. Even to these groups their own territory is generally off limits to outsiders. These groups are mainly comprised of newbs. Almost all vets are RPKers with a few noteable exceptions. (Like Lord Zanuul on Darkfall or GL on Freelancer.)
Personally I would like to see the balance in PFO be:
A majority of players who will not attack you without good cause, though these factions may war among themselves a bit, because of personality differences and territorial disputes / expansionistic tendencies.
A minority of players who will rob you or kill you if you try to resist.
A tiny minority of players who will randomly kill everyone they aren't allied to.
A negligible population of griefers.
Given the natural tendency with no restrictions is for most veterans to become RPKers, you achieve this by offering benefits to good and lawful behavior, and penalties to anti-social behavior.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I'm more thinking mechanically, how do you reflect those alignments? How do you GET there?
There is a reason I talked a lot about lawful good and chaotic evil.
It's hard for me to picture basing chaotic good and lawful evil off game mechanics.
Ideally some actions would need to be effect only one axis. It's just hard for me to picture what those actions would be. Most chaotic actions are also evil and most good actions are also lawful.
In terms of game mechanics anyway.
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Goblin Squad Member
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That's the same problem I'm having! I really can't think of mechanisms for those alignments lol which is also why I brought up the lawful evil necromancer, because I can see that, evil acts that don't have to be criminal acts, but in the middle? I got nothing. But it still means I can see the 2 axes rather than just the chaotic evil to lawful good linear alignment
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Goblin Squad Member
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I thought Lee's post in the blog thread made things simple:
* law-chaos is about playstyle. Lawful is more eficient but restricts your actions (or you will be neutral), chaos is less efficient but gives full freedom of choice. .
* good-evil is more about flavour and which factions you can ally with/join. Basically "us-them" rather than trying to define what an evil/good act is or guess your true motivations. "real life evil" behaviour will be dealt with by real admins, not by the alignment system. I expect doing quests and sacrificing to Asmodeus should make you more evil, while helping the paladins makes you more good.
* in addition to the above it seems some abilities will be alignment restricted. Whether that favours certain alignments is to be seen.
Alignment change for certain behaviour means that certain playstyles drift towards certain alignments. The point is not that becoming chaotic evil necessarily is a punishment for ganking, the point is that if I identify someone as chaotic (evil) I become extremely wary of them, and if ganked I will partly blame myself for being careless. On the other hand, if griefed by a paladin i'd probably tell a GM.
Lawful evils are the guys who want to build the most efficient settlement to conquer the world map. They won't grief you as an individual, but will instead blitzkrieg your settlement under legal rules of engagement. They might as easily be lawful good, except they decided the mechanical rewards of evil alliances were better.
chaotic good.. i would be suspicious to chaotic good.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Chaotic Good = Robin Hood, 'good' rogue, 'The Rebel Alliance', someone who has no regard for the laws, but still helps people.
Stealing is Chaotic, not evil. You can be good with no regard for laws. You can trespass and steal all you want and you won't shift evil.
Stealing is or isn't evil depending on what you are stealing from whom and for what reason.
That is why I find it so hard to translate into game mechanics. Most thievery is evil but how can the game establish what is and isn't? Maybe it could be based on the alignment of the owner?
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Goblin Squad Member
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I'm not sure, if you take Javert from Les miserables as an example, he is a strict follower of the law, utterly heartless and ruthless in his duty. He'd be lawful good I think in some interpretations, yet I would have no problems with someone knocking him out and stealing from him to benefit someone who needs it :p
So I agree, it's really hard to work out the mechanics
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Goblinworks Executive Founder
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Chaotic Good = Robin Hood, 'good' rogue, 'The Rebel Alliance', someone who has no regard for the laws, but still helps people.
Stealing is Chaotic, not evil. You can be good with no regard for laws. You can trespass and steal all you want and you won't shift evil.
Stealing is or isn't evil depending on what you are stealing from whom and for what reason.
That is why I find it so hard to translate into game mechanics. Most thievery is evil but how can the game establish what is and isn't? Maybe it could be based on the alignment of the owner?
Stealing isn't inherently good or evil. That's what "stealing is chaotic" means. Most characters that casually steal are evil, but all characters that casually steal are chaotic.
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Goblin Squad Member
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My problem is I'm thinking that through to an inevitable conclusion. If stealing purely gives you chaos points, that means the person stealing your copper dagger and stale bread 10 seconds after you join the game could very well be chaotic good.
A chaotic good thief could go around stealing absolutely anything they want, from everyone they want. And how many other behaviors like that will being chaotic allow? We already know it will allow you to break your word when you take contracts.
It paints a very evil looking picture to me when you consider what a chaotic good character can do and become if the system works that way.
I consider myself a very neutral good person. To me chaotic good is the bane of lawful evil. While a lawful good character may be unable to deal with a lawful evil tryrant who does all their misdeeds within the confines of the law, a chaotic good character will lie, cheat, and steal... in order to push forward the agenda of good.
In the system I see being described I feel myself retreating into the corner of lawful good. Not because I believe it's ideals or want to behave in a lawful good manner. Because I see myself wanting to deal with chaotic evil masquerading as chaotic good.
That's why I think that most chaotic actions like stealing, if targeted at non-evil players, should earn you chaotic and evil points, while if they are directed at evil players, earn you pure chaos points.
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Goblin Squad Member
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It is the reasons of an action and how do we help make a system that understands this?
Best I've seen so far is "A Jury of Your Peers"... Not really practical for every little thing that happens in an MMO.
If killing is always an evil act...
It's not! Killing someone with whom you are at war is not evil. Killing someone who attacked you is not evil. Etc.
But I understand the point you're trying to make. It's actually one of the reasons I'm so happy that they're basing Alignment on the in-game Deities rather than on the philosophical aspects of it in the real world. In-game Deities aren't necessarily perfect, so it's okay if they're wrong :)
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Goblin Squad Member
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So I've put a bit more thought into the war system and there is one thing that really comes to mind. The most meaningful player interaction I have ever had was what I refer to as "The Lord Wars."
The "Lord" Clan established control of a a region and taxed anyone who traded within their space. Lords were a legitimate navy clan. Their taxes were low, and they provided protection from piracy within their space.
This was really the dawn of Great Legionnaires as PVPers, before this we had really been a PVE clan, but back then we where quite a bit more chaotic good, and getting taxed to use one of the primary trade routes in the game REALLY did not sit well with me.
Great Legionnaires were anti-pirates who protected the interests of neutral traders.
Lords were anti-pirates who protected neutral traders.
But our differing opinions on taxation sparked a war that lasted well over a year, and it was only the first of two. It was combat on a massive scale. GL rallied many other smaller factions behind our cause and Lords were just... big. They were by far the biggest clan on the server at the start of those wars.
If GL had be flagged evil for fighting the Lords over taxation... The Lord Wars never would have happened. Which really would have killed the chance for a lot of great conflict and meaningful interaction that didn't harm neutral players or encourage random ganking.
Because of this I think I can accept some of Blaeringr's ideas in a war system. I'll throw in a few of my own too.
1. Wars can be declared on any settlement holding organization. I think this is acceptable given that settlement holding organizations must be at least fairly well established.
2. If the target of the war declaration is good or neutral, the organization declaring war moves slightly toward the evil axis. It shouldn't effect the chaos axis because lawful good and lawful evil kingdoms war all the time.
3. War targets CANNOT be attacked safely in neutral towns. ESPECIALLY player towns unless those players choose to allow it. The guards will treat it as they would any other random act of violence in their peaceful streets.
4. If a good or neutral organization has a war declared on them, any organization can join the war on their side without taking alignment loss.
5. Wars last a week. They can be renewed before they expire or set to be automatically renewed, but the alignment loss is reapplied on each renewal.
I may be forgetting something but I'll come back and post it later if I am.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Perhaps the solution is to move things along multiple axes at once. Stealing is slightly evil, but mostly chaotic, if you do good deeds mostly, you'll end up chaotic but good, but if you're stealing just from anyone at any time, you'll end up cn or ce, depending on what else you do.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I want you all to think very carfully on what you think some of these actions would be for an alignment shift what would it do?
chop down a tree.
mountain top removal of a well loved landmark.
kill a fox and skin it then leave the mean to rot.
walk though a forest and spread large amounts of coins.
poison a public well.
summon a planar creature from vahalla.
creat an undead zombie.
cast redemtion on a mass murderer.
cast cure wounds on a theif who is on the run.
kill every member of an evil sydicate in the name of asmodais.
decalre war on a settlement that has no chance of winning.
sell a sword to a know assasin.
build a house free of charge.
kill a bandit only to realize they were bringing back the goods they stole.
Leave a member of an oposing force alive with a few healing potions.think of a few and get back to me on it.
chop down a tree: In PFO, this has nothing to with alignment.
mountain top removal of a well loved landmark: In PFO, this has nothing to with alignment.
kill a fox and skin it then leave the mean to rot: In PFO, this has nothing to with alignment.
walk though a forest and spread large amounts of coins: In PFO, this has nothing to with alignment.
poison a public well: depends on mechanics, but would likely be evil.
summon a planar creature from vahalla: Good.
creat an undead zombie: Evil
cast redemtion on a mass murderer: Depends on mechanics, likely not possible or evil.
cast cure wounds on a theif who is on the run: Ditto
kill every member of an evil sydicate in the name of asmodais: Evil
decalre war on a settlement that has no chance of winning: Based on Dev comments, not mechanically possible. However, in PFO, this has nothing to with alignment.
sell a sword to a know assasin: Interesting question--I don't think there's been any discussion on commerce/contracting with evil.
build a house free of charge: In PFO, this has nothing to with alignment.
kill a bandit only to realize they were bringing back the goods they stole: In PFO, this has nothing to with alignment.
Leave a member of an oposing force alive with a few healing potions: In PFO, this has nothing to with alignment.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I'm not sure if "casting cure wounds on a thief who is on the run" IS evil. What if you're a healer of one of those groups that believes it is their duty to heal ANYONE in need? I think that would make you lawful good. Mechanically it would make you a criminal though.
It's complicated!