Karthas077's page

@HalfOrcHeavyMetal

That only encourages people to create two characters, a criminal, and a spender. There can never be a harsh enough punishment akin to RL theft conciquences, because people can just switch characters/accounts.

Check my post on consequences of 'hot property' trading. Multiple characters or accounts would have zero impact on this system's implementation.

To build on that thought: Have the amount of time an item remains 'hot property' be proportionate to its value. Obviously more expensive items are more unique and more likely to be identified as stolen.

Furthermore, rather than allowing players to simply offload their goods and leave them there, have the timer for 'hot property' only progress while players are logged in on the character in possession of the item.

Bounties would be placed on the items (while they are still hot) and if a rogue with stolen goods is killed, the hot property is looted and can be returned for a reward. Alternatively, if the rogue chooses to offload the stolen goods into storage (perhaps one cannot place stolen goods into the 100% secure storage, necessitating the use of a bank or guild store-room) an inquisitor/Paladin/justiciar/etc. might be able to conduct impromptu searches of banks for stolen goods. Various skill ranks such as diplomacy, sense motive, perception, appraise, etc. might be placed in direct opposition to the skills of the thief who owns the bank, allowing for LN characters to earn money via recovery of stolen goods, just as a CN character can theoretically earn money stealing them. For obvious reasons there would be limits to how often a LN character can conduct an 'investigation' and limits to what he is able to find. In theory though the recovery rate for items would be somewhere around 50-75% (random numbers subject to balance). If a thief is good enough to get away with stealing something valuable for long enough to evade not only the NPC's but also PC's interested in recovering the items, they just invested effort into making money just like any other player. Just because it's 'illegal' doesn't make it non-viable for PFO. In fact, many Evil aligned acts are illegal. That doesn't prevent characters from exploring those options.

Addendum:
This might also generate an extremely organic 'black market' amongst evil aligned characters involving acquisition and trade of stolen/illegal goods.

Thievery must have a cost, and a high one. Players who go out into the environment to gain material to build the community have a high risk. What risk does a rogue have if they can just walk up to bank, click "rob", and find out if they made money or not? With a low death penalty, there is no risk.

Secondly, if thievery is an option, as the game grows, what is to stop a player from creating a large number of characters, who all have a + 15 to their disable device (5 from dex, 1 from trait, 1 from rank, 3 from class skill, 3 from skill focus, 2 from masterwork tools)? Suddenly, all you have to do is walk a buck naked character up to a bank, holding only their tools, to have a 5% chance of looting the bank. That takes no skill, and yet runs the risk of stealing something valuable from a player.

TLDR: Banditry is fine. Theft is not.

If you'd checked my proposed system, you'd know that even the most rudimentary of bank would require something akin to a level 10 rogue to even have a chance of being robbed. Hardly something you can mass produce, especially given the real-time limitations on skill training.

I believe there would be a system in place to prevent such abuse. Of course, my belief is that in such a huge job such as a bank robbery, this would HAVE TO be a TEAM effort. Of course, one rogue could open the vault and take the stuff inside; but he would need a distraction, say a bard, a mage to assist in suppression of magical security systems in place, and a very stout character that can carry the loot while still being able to run a good pace. They would also need a mobile healer that can keep them alive while they escape, as well one backup team to help deal with those trying to prevent their escape, as well as another backup team traveling close to the escapees to replace the roles of any possible fallen. This level of organization would require a PC thieves' guild all working together towards that similar goal.

TL;DR - Robbing an NPC bank should NEVER be a solo effort.

While I disagree that it would HAVE to be a team effort, I agree with the premise. Namely that robbing a bank should be so difficult it is exceedingly impractical for a single player to pull off. The only reason I would say it doesn't NEED to require other people, is that the capabilities of a player at level 20, especially when they can hit the capstones for multiple archetypes, allows for a rogue 20/wizard 20 to disable magical and mundane traps, make himself invisible, move silently, and put the loot he's stealing into pocket dimensions.

That said, anti-magic spheres and locks that require specific magic keys can make it prohibitively difficult for even a 20/20 character to pull off alone. For any level of skill a thief might have, it's always possible to add more layers of security to a vault.

TBH, if they want to create NPC banks to steal from, that is fine. But I do not like having items stolen without me being able to actively oppose that effort. Banditry? Sure, I know they will be coming and roughly when, and can act to keep my goods safe. With a thief, I can't actively try to stop it, and that would annoy me no end. He'd be playing against a static target for PvP.

The other problem is, once you get a few years into the game, what is to stop really good rogues from robbing new players blind, just because they can? Lastly, in towns, there are rules against PvP (the town guards knock you to pieces). Why would we let thievery (which is PvP) happen, but not banditry?

As we've mentioned several times in this thread, Dev's have guaranteed 100% secure methods of storage. The purpose of this thought experiment is for the discussion of stealing items which cannot reasonably be stored in that manner because of limited capacity or other reasons.

New players, prior to having a source of gold, would be unable to afford a good vault. As such, they would rely on their personal 100% secure storage until they got enough money to where they could protect their assets just like high level players.

Ultimately, people who are objecting to the concept of 'having their stuff taken when they were asleep' should re-read my proposal.

Things are stolen all the time in the real world, and the victims in question have even less of a guarantee of reimbursement than the characters in this game would have under my system.

Ultimately, how much are you REALLY sacrificing for the sake of realism if MAYBE once every other month or so, one of your items is stolen and replaced with gold (courtesy of the bank) sufficient to re-purchase the missing item at market value?

MAYBE 10-15 minutes of your time?

Is your time really so valuable that you can't afford to spend 10-15 minutes a MONTH for the sake of realism?

Andius wrote:

my mom said I was Satanic. A position she still maintains.

this may be the funniest thing I read all day.

My mom thought the same thing. It wasn't until she happened to witness me and my friends playing together (I had not told her WHAT we were playing, just that we were 'playing a game') that she realized she was wrong.

There are things that in canon Golarion are DEFINITELY deserving of an Adult only rating... *cough* Ogres *cough*

That said, there is no way in hell this game can possibly be rated under T.

Even if you keep out excessive blood and gore and include a language filter, theres no way that worlds of undeath and chaos could ever drop under that rating.

Now it's a given that kids under the 'appropriate' ages will play games like this, but that's not what ESRB is for. If you can assume everyone involved is about 14, even if those kids aren't getting involved in some of the grittier dark fantasy RPs going on, they probably won't NEGATIVELY impact the game.

You give your credit card information for them to set up the account.

Except... you don't...

Goblin works has stated on numerous occasions that you do NOT need to pay in order to play in PFO. That necessarily means that no credit card is needed to create an account.

Nihimon wrote:

I'm not even sure you can ban "credit cards" without really pissing off someone who's brother or kid got banned.

And?

And that's not a sound business strategy.

Don't offer that payment option. Please. It was the worst idea ever. Did it bring in more customers? Yes. Were those "commercial" customers worth the damage they did to the "gaming" experience? I don't believe so. Quanitity vs. Quality. Unfortunately, from a commercial enterprise aspect, quantity almost always wins.

That's a terrible idea. Some people don't have access to credit cards. All they have is cash, and MAYBE a checking account. Getting rid of every player who doesn't own a credit card would get rid of the same percentage of quality players as preventing any other payment method.

Further more, as I stated above, since accounts can be made without either a credit or game card, removing this as a payment option would do LITERALLY nothing but prevent goblinworks from making money.

How about parents monitor what their children are doing? My 9 and 12 year olds play Modern Warfare 3, rated M for Mature. My 9 year old doesn't have a mic and won't until he's 12. My 12 year old has to keep his door open so we can hear what he is saying and see what he is doing. He thought it'd be cool to curse at someone after he killed them. It wasn't so cool when I made him apologize then turn the game off. He didn't touch the game for a month.

Though I will say that I don't think children under the age of 14 should be swearing, simply because of its colloquial use, this is probably one of the least of your concerns.

If you let your "kid" brother play Pathfinder, your brother should be old enough to understand what a User-Agreement is and understand what getting banned means. Otherwise, your "kid" brother has no business playing the game.

Agreed

This too can be exploited by passing an item from one person to another back and forth. Limit the amount of feedback achievable from one person to another. Don't allow those accounts who have characters in the same charter to rate each other. This is the only other option I see working beside a strict user-agreement.

I think preventing people in the same charter from giving feedback is a bad idea, as those are the people you'll be having a very decent percentage of your interactions with. Rather, I think each account should only be able to rate each other account once.

Except for the part where they have to stay the hell away from any good aligned divine caster. Lich's detect as both undead and evil.

Meh. It was worth a shot, but if people think it's too complicated or just don't like it...
I guess if it came down to it them I'd rather have access to all my abilities all the time than have any sort of hard cap.

I dislike the idea of only being able to have 8 or 16 or whatever magic number is decided upon abilities at once.

First of all, re-rolling characters to do it over and over. So that gets around your cooldown idea.

Second, they have not said yet that assassination will require items and rituals. They have only said it will be more complicated than just killing someone. Whatever it requires, a cooperative target will make it much easier.

First of all it would require 3 players each time, not just 2:

Furthermore, as a potential solution:
Make assassinated characters unable to be deleted until after a certain cooldown has passed. (I'm thinking a week?)

Then it's simply a matter of preventing accounts with a certain number of assassinated characters from impacting hexes with either their deaths, or with deaths they carry out.

Alternatively, you could have the effect of assassination on a single hex follow a something like a logarithmic curve.

Each subsequent assassination would have a diminishing effect upon the populace.

Finding out there is 1 assassin in your midst would be terrifying. Finding out there are 2 would be even more so. But after a certain point, the number of assassins/assassinations becomes just 'a number'. and the impact further deaths would have would be negligible.

I would also put the 'counter' for this curve on something like a week long timer.

Random number example:
Whenever someone is assassinated, the impact of that death would be equal to 1/A where A is the number of assassinated characters in that hex in the last 7 days.

So if we started at an arbitrary measure of '0' in terms of chaos.

1 assassination would mean '1' chaos. 2 assassinations would be '1.5' chaos. then '1.75' and so on.

This puts a cap on how much a single hex can be impacted by rampant assassination in a single week.

With THIS example, in means constant assassination would have a measure of '2' impact upon the hex each week.

Obviously the value of an assassination and the equation for the diminishing returns could be adjusted to find a 'fair' solution, but yeah...

As long as the effects are related to the source of the conflict/change that's fine.

I just don't want to see undead rising from their graves because there's a rebellion the next kingdom over. Nor should I be experiencing bandit problems if the neighboring city has been taken over by a cult of necromancers.

The only thing I would add to this is just nit-picky about the consequences of hexes shifting alignment towards chaos/evil.

If a good kingdom splits into two factions, the resulting chaos should primarily result in banditry, refugees, and possibly some goblin or other neutral monsters taking advantage of the instability.

Things like undead, devils, demons, and other monstrous creatures should be reserved for the shifts towards evil that result from cultists of various evil deities sacrificing innocents and the like.

@Andius, In case it wasn't made clear in my earlier posts, I think this system is absolutely brilliant. Everything from it's intended purpose to the actual mechanics of it resonate very strongly with what I believe companies and alignments are intended to bring to PFO.

I mean this system encourages a company to accept people of only 1 alignment. I'd rather not see that happen. If the bonus for doing lawful acts while part of a LG company, that is fine. It encourages the player to act in a certain faction, but doesn't penalize the company for being a bit broader and allowing more players in.

It still sounds like you're trying to justify LG companies letting Chaotic Neutral or worse members into their ranks.

This is something that SHOULD NOT HAPPEN.

If you want Chaotic Neutral members in your company, make your company Neutral Good, or True Neutral. It's that simple.

I like the idea of enhancing or detracting from a hex based on actions. Not too sure how I feel about companies being encouraged to stick to one alignment, and one alignment only. That makes for some rather restrictive and anti-social behavior from companies, something that I *don't* want to see encouraged in PFO.

I don't understand your objection.

Are you saying you want Lawful Good companies to allow Evil aligned players to join? or are you saying that a Lawful Good company should be allowed to change it's alignment to Neutral Good, or Lawful Neutral, at a later point in time?

If your complaint is the first, I think you're sorely misunderstanding the purpose of this system. It makes no sense for a LG company to allow an CE character to join. They are diametrically opposed alignments... There's not a chance in the universe that Paladins of Iomedae would let a sociopathic serial killer join their ranks.

If your complaint is the second, it's moot as Andius pointed out that companies/kingdoms would be allowed to change their group's alignment.

To add to that, I think it would be interesting if when it came time to change a group's alignment, you were only allowed to change to an alignment that would decrease the overall score.

You might start as a NG mercenary group, but if enough CG players join, switching the group alignment to CG would lower your score.

This would also force companies to 'cull' members from their rosters if they wanted to change in a direction that would otherwise be opposed.

If the aforementioned NG company instead wanted to become LG, they would need to remove all (or at least most) of the CG players from the list in order for the change to be appropriate.

This process would force companies to mimic real life changes in leadership/purpose. When the leadership changes, or when the companies mission changes, those whose views are incompatible have to be let go.

(Even if such a requirement isn't included, I am definitely a fan of this system or one very similar to it)

Just let people CHOOSE what Alignment label they want to have for thier characters and don't have the game change it, let it be a function of flavor rather then a game-play decision. Do that, and you'll find that most people will actualy PLAY/Role-Play thier characters in a manner consistant with the Alignment they've selected for them....they have no reason not to do so.

I object to this concept on such a fundamental level it honestly shocks me to see these words coming from you.

they have no reason not to do so?

What reason does a griefer have for ANYTHING they do? "FOR THE LULZ"?

If you implement alignment as simply a choice, it will cease to have any meaning at all, one month into the game.

Alignment NEEDS to be representative of something REAL. Detect Alignment spells exist for a reason.

Otherwise, you'll have griefers running around with the label 'Good' stabbing people in the face or conducting otherwise Evil aligned deeds with zero consequence.

I'd rather have people making evil, disposable alts to create assassination contracts than have 'good aligned' characters murdering babies because it doesn't affect their alignment.

they seem to be weak end-game when scripted encounters specifically need a certain number of dps or whatever and a rogue or mage will "do the job better" .

Did you not see my post DIRECTLY above yours? XD

Bards do not have to be weak. People play them weak because they are taking a 'support' role. If that role is already filled, they can be just as good if not better than many of the other classes.

There is no such thing as 120% effectiveness. Let's all just agree to drop that terminology. It's not just what people would "think" it's reality.

Maximum effectiveness is 100%. If you go beyond that, that new number becomes 100%. Period. No other way to look at the math.

No offense but you obviously don't understand math then.

Statements involving percentiles beyond 100 are only applicable when making comparisons.

eg.- "12 is 120% of 10"
"I made a return of 120% my original investment"

Saying a trained ability is operating at 120% effectiveness means it is 20% more effective than the untrained ability.

There's a huge distinction between a lack of a bonus, and a penalty. If you were to rephrase this comparison to make the trained ability 100%, players would only be operating at 83% effectiveness if they didn't train. It's a much more 'positive' perspective to say you're being rewarded for training rather than being punished for not training.

@Karthas077, I am on board with your proposal as long as it's not based on how many abilities I have "equipped". If it is based on that, then it seems just as unrealistic that I'm suddenly much less effective at something I could be much more effective at if I "forgot" how to Backstab, for example. The reason I mentioned skill decay is because I saw this as a possible way to implement your proposal. Of course, for my plan to work, PFO would have to allow us to distribute our training points among several simultaneous channels. I'm not sure they're open to that idea.

Obviously the system isn't perfect, because nothing can truly emulate how people retain physical skill training in real life, but this solution is ultimately more realistic than both the 'hard cap' and 'no-limit' systems.

All three have aspects that 'aren't realistic', but this one, in my opinion, minimizes those discrepancies.

Even if this system isn't put into the game, I hope that it will at least make the developers put more consideration into making ability caps make sense and appear 'realistic'.

Neowiz and Epic Games Korea are the ones working on BLESS.

I found sites that had both Goblinworks AND Neowiz/Epic Games Korea listed as the developers for Pathfinder Online in different articles.

Probably an investigative journalism faux pas.

Well, as far as underlying design goal, people were arguing over two options.

A Hard limit of how many abilities you could have equipped. Changing equipped abilities required leaving combat or going back to town.

In either case, the objection was brought up that from a realism perspective that mechanic didn't make sense. How did equipping 8 other abilities suddenly make you 'forget' how to pick locks?

One solution to that would be to simply have all utility abilities available at all times, and simply limit combat abilities.

The other position was that all abilities ever learned should always be available, with the argument that your character couldn't 'forget' to use something by 'not equipping it'.

This system, from a design position, is intended to deliver the sort of 'balance' that a hard-limit is intended to enforce, while still maintaining a sense of realism and freedom from a no-limit system.

It also incentivizes players carefully evaluating their ability choices. If you're about to walk into a cave, and you have no clue what will be inside, how many abilities should you equip? What things should you be prepared for?

In summary, the goal of the system is to provide balance and freedom without sacrificing realism.

Example, I start out a wizard, tool around and find its just not my style. I don't want to pay for another character slot, or I'm on the free to play account or whatever, and I decide I'd rather be a raging barbarian axe-fiend and i mess with this for a while. If I understand your system, once I decide wading into combat and killing things with my face is silly, and my initial impulse to be a wizard was awesome. I "switch" my skills and find they are 40% less than when I last used them. As a player, how does this system feel fair to me, how is my enjoyment of the game enriched, and how does this encourage me to try new things?

The only reason your wizard abilities would be 40% less would be if you were trying to keep your barbarian abilities 'equipped' at the same time.

As long as you didn't go over the ability hotbar 'limit' (whatever it may be) all of your wizard spells would still function at 100%.

The system simply creates a less arbitrary cap for how many abilities you can have at once by making it a soft cap rather than a hard limit. Furthermore, it prevents a character who has reached the capstone in several trees from being able to operate at 100% effectiveness all the time without pausing between combat to switch out his skill selection. If he wanted EVERY ability he ever learned available all at once, he'd be taking penalties for going over the cap.

More concrete example using made up numbers:

Cleric 10/ Fighter 10/ Paladin 10. The goal is to be a holy warrior.

If the ability cap is 8 for someone of his 'level' and intelligence, he might equip:

1-Smite
2-Cleave
3-Cure moderate wounds
4-Charge
5-Shield slam
6-Restoration
7-Lay on Hands
8-Righteous Might

All of those abilities, regardless of how long it has been since he used them, would operate at full capacity.

If on the other hand he proceeded to add:

9-Divine Favor*
10-Cure Light wounds*
11-Remove Curse*
12-Control Undead*
13-Power Attack*

All of the abilities that he hadn't spent time using in game would operate at decreased effectiveness dependent upon how far over the limit he went, and how long it had been since he used them.

For simplicities sake let's say his 1-8 abilities are his core that he uses all the time.

This allows him to cycle out slots 9-13 for ANY 5 abilities, without regard to how recently he practiced them, and only take say a 10% penalty on those 5. The other 8 (due to frequent use) would remain 100%.

If on the other hand, he groups up with a barbarian, and decides to be less of a tank and more of a healer, he can drop Cleave, Power Attack, Charge, Shield Slam, and Smite.

His new ability list:
1-Cure moderate wounds
2-Restoration
3-Lay on Hands
4-Righteous Might
5-Divine Favor*
6-Cure Light wounds*
7-Remove Curse*
8-Control Undead*

His abilities Divine Favor, Cure Light Wounds, Remove Curse, and Control Undead are still 'unpracticed' but because he has not gone over his 8 ability limit, they operate at 100% rather than 90%.

So I know I mentioned it, but I never really gave a concrete example.
So, seeing as most adventure paths end at 17, here is a level 17 Half-elf Dawnflower Dervish bard.
By himself.
With his only gear consisting of a +5 Mithral Chain Shirt, +5 Human Bane Scimitar, and a +6 Belt of Physical Perfection.
These are his stats for 17 rounds of combat a day:
40 AC
+45/+45/+40/+35 Attack
3d6+29 Damage
34 Acrobatics
19 Fort
19 Wil
28 Reflex
139 HP (average for all HD other than first, which was max)

Finally, @Karthas077, why haven't you yet applied with The Seventh Veil? Seriously, we want you, and people like you.

I've been meaning to... I just keep forgetting to actually go and do it. DX

In addition to the question I asked earlier about evil-aligned contracts to raid caravans/intercept deliveries, I did have a more /normal/ question about Loan contracts.

Will it be possible for a person giving out a loan to choose to ignore the escrow portion of the contract?

Because to me, that defeats the entire purpose of the loan...

If you have something worth 3,000 gold to put up for escrow, why do you need a 2,000 gold loan?
Loans are needed because you don't have enough money to buy something that will end up making you money.

If you can afford to lock away that 3,000 gold thing in escrow, you obviously don't need it for your money making plan.

So instead of potentially losing it if you default on the loan:
Sell the 3,000 dollar thing, buy whatever it is you needed the 2,000 for.
(Have 1,000 extra you wouldn't have gotten via loan).
Proceed to make back the money that would have paid off the loan.
Repurchase that 3,000 gold item.

I personally would love to see items placed in escrow not actually TAKEN from the player when they are 'put in escrow'.

Instead, if you default on the loan and do not give up the escrowed item/money, you can have a bounty put on your head.
Items that are supposed to be in 'escrow' will not be tradable, and then it's just a matter of time before a bounty hunter finds you, Knocks you unconscious(Referencing my previous question about non-killing bounties)
and takes the item you refused to give up.

You would keep all your other inventory items as you never actually died, but until the bounty was collected you would have a lesser criminal flag. (Not killed on sight by NPC's but possibly knocked out and detained for a few minutes. The item confiscated, and a message sent via spell to the player to whom the item lawfully belongs)

Technically this would be expanding the bounty hunter contract, but I thought that might be simpler than creating a 'repo-man' contract.

Apparently MANY people are just outright not understanding the system I proposed.

ability decay is a strong disincentive to play after any break in gameplay at all

I just finished explaining that breaks in gameplay would not have any sort of decay involved. Only time spent actually LOGGED IN, would count towards the amount of time needed to spend working on a skill.

Furthermore, I have never mentioned anything about 'retraining' or having to spend points on any such activity. I also never said that the abilities themselves would decay.

What I said was actively using an ability would keep you from being penalized while equipping 'too many' abilities.

You could not use a sword for a whole month of playtime, choosing instead to use a mace and a shield. What that would mean is.

'equipping' your sword-based ability by default operates at the same power it always has. No decay has occurred.

Equipping your sword based ability at the same time as 20 other shield based abilities that you have made constant use of, would cause all shield based abilities to operate at full power, but your sword based ability would be hindered by going over the limit placed by int/character level(or it's abstraction)

This allows a rogue to go into combat specced for bleed, discover that the dungeon he's walked into is full of things immune to bleed, and next time he's out of combat change his spec entirely for burst (something he hasn't done in a while).

As long as he doesn't try to keep his bleed build equipped at the same time, his burst abilities will be just as powerful as they have always been, regardless of how long it's been since he's used them.

At the same time, that rogue PRIOR to entering the dungeon, might equip both his bleed and his burst abilities. Because he uses bleed abilities regularly they operate at full strength, but if he happens to run into something immune to bleed, at least he has other abilities to work with (even if they operate at 80% because he went over the 16 ability limit)

Furthermore, I would imagine that the penalty for 'overequipping' abilities would never go beyond 40% or so, and they would lift extremely quickly.
A character should be able to completely reset what ability sets count as 'trained' for the purposes of preventing over-equipped penalties in 8 in game hours (2 real life hours).

It might seem like a lot, but completely reseting an ability set to me would be changing from 16 abilities to 16 different abilities.
And the % reduction would change on a logarithmic curve. Using the abilities to kill 10 enemies might reduce the penalty by 15%. Then 10 more might be 10%. then 5%. etc.

Additionally, as what I've said might have hinted at, you could have all relevant abilities clustered into 'trees' that train together for the purposes of preventing the over-equipped penalty. For example "shield abilities" or "sword abilities" or "dual wield abilities".

This defuses unsolvable endless ethical arguments. "Is create undead an evil act?" is an ethical question, and we can always come up with scenarios to justify it. But the second we instead see it as an evil spell (as part of alignment), there's no more problem: the SRD identifies it as an evil spell. And we decide that "Souldrinker" is an evil-only weapon, and that the Grove of Good Elves is a good/neutral entrance area only, etc.

To be fair, Create Undead can be cast by Non-Evil characters. (See Juju Mystery Oracle)

However this is an exception and in no way diminishes the validity of your statement.

However, I find it hard to conceive of in-game mechanics that have any control or influence over how a player (not a character) chooses to conduct themselves in forming alliances with other players.

Edit to clarify: Apparently the Juju oracle is somewhat misprinted. Apparently the create undead spells are still evil, but other otherwise evil spells are not.

I disagree. Strongly.

Ability decay IS arbitrary. The rate of the decay is just picked out of the air. Why should I lose 1% effectiveness after one day, or 10 days, or 100 days? Or 10% effectiveness, or 20%.

Why should a player with 5 years played who takes 2 months off for RL issues come back to a game effectively gimped relative to players who are 2 weeks old but been playing like maniacs for those 2 weeks?

I think accomplishments in character advancement NEED to be tangible, and sustained. To not have that in place diminishes the accomplishments in the first place. And with diminished goals, why bother achieving?

While I did not specify it, I think it is fair to assume that ability decay would be based on a percentage of a time spent playing rather than how much time passed IRL. So unless he was logged in and afk for those 2 months that wouldn't happen.

(Just like you train new abilities while logged out, it would be assumed that you are training all current abilities equally while logged out preventing the decay)

Especially since some people are going to want to RP as athiest or agnostic. Then again in a world where the existence of gods is indisputable and they are known to reward their followers I don't see why they shouldn't take a penalty for that. Especially if following a god requires some effort.

Iconic Wizard is athiest.

The key thing about athiesm in the Pathfinder universe is it's not "I don't believe in god". Their existence is irrefutable. Athiesm in Golarion is more a matter of "I want to choose my own fate".

Most Athiests are Arcane Casters (Wizards, Sorcerers, Alchemists), and even then they are extremely rare. Most of the people who have the mentality to be athiest still end up paying tribute to Nethys.

I'm interested if it's possible moles deliberately doing what the group does and having their alignment change; but snidely reporting back to the opposite alignment group's HQ. I wonder how said infiltrator would be able to "wipe the slate clean" after completing their mission and returning back to their handlers?

90% of that would need to be done with RP, but if they're including the 'detect alignment' spells, they should probably include "Undetectable Alignment" as well.

Of course you'd show up as true neutral which might be suspicious but hey, better than showing up as evil right?

@Karthas077, it sounds like you want to add an additional use-based training system on top of the skill-training system that's already been described. Is that accurate?

While not technically correct, that statement is nonetheless accurate. I would only clarify it by saying the ability-use wouldn't 'train' the ability or improve it. I was merely attempting to provide an alternative to the two extremes of "maximum number of active abilities" and "no maximum number of active abilities" that had enough of a foundation in reality that it might be accepted.

Even if this system still resembles 'use-based training' too much for it to be implemented, it's purpose and premise still remains and I hope will be taken into consideration when deciding how to set up ability hotbars.

Alas, some of my opinions are extremely unpopular but I'd like to take this opportunity to say I absolutely adore the tactical niche of the bard. It's this performance stuff that irks me.

Comedy? Dance? These things seem even lamer than singing in battle.

I dance. You gain X buff.

I tell a joke. You gain Y buff.

I adore the archaeologist, I really do. When I first heard of pathfinder I thought to myself, "For the love of god I hope the bard either doesn't exist or has been stripped of this performance stuff." I certainly hope a non-performing bard appears soon after launch so I can allow the class in my clan.

If you have ever listened to a song and felt 'pumped up' or 'energized' before doing a physical activity, you essentially benefited from a singing/musical instrument playing bard.

To echo SolidHalo, music as motivation has been around in battle for ages. It only stopped being as relevant once the scale and pace of battle became prohibitively dangerous (Introduction of automatic weapons).

But having a man on drums or a bugle was simply a part of fighting. Same thing with hunting horns.

2) combat should have the open-world pvp in mind ,friendly fire ,cover ,terrain, flanking should be taken into consideration or we will end up with "whoever has more guys wins the fight" . autohit combat is a step in the wrong direction here , you can tab to target someone behind a tree , you can cast a spell and it does not check line of sight , you cannot have backhits or flanking. it is definitely a no go .

To be fair WoW still requires you to have LOS to cast spells, and they did have a system for rogues to establish if you were 'behind' someone.

Now, it's been so many years since I've played that I can no longer remember how well those were implemented but I agree about things like flanking/cover. I think trying to shoot someone behind the lines of melee combat should be harder (Players provide cover for each other for ranged attacks if there are enough of them in the way). Similarly, shooting someone who's in melee combat has always incurred a penalty.

I am curious to see if there will be ANY sort of 'grapple' based system.
With the way pathfinder changed grapples (You no longer move your target into your square, they're adjacent to you) I would imagine that a target who is 'grappled' would simply have a debuff on them preventing them from moving out of 'melee range' of their grappler (And of course losing their Dex to AC if that's a thing). They would still be able to move about within that range, but it might add some interesting character types. (Tetori Monk anyone?)

You make the claim above the Ryan is confusing evil with chaos, but then every counter example you provide of why he is wrong, you reference a lawful society/being, evil or not. I just looked for a reference and failed to find one, but I think the LE and CE entities (devils and demons respectively) have been at war since the beginning of time. They fight each other as much as they fight good. LG and CG on the other hand, do not (often) fight each other (although they may not prefer each others company). They are united in their fight against evil. It actually becomes a three way war between G/CE/LE. Good would be crushed if CE and LE (Abyss and Hell) ever stopped fighting each other to unify against Heaven, Nirvana, and Elysium. But, CE and LE cannot stop fighting...it is by definition not in their nature.

Conflict existing between Lawful Evil and Chaotic Evil is not the same as all Evil destroying itself. Evil destroying itself to me would imply all organizations, regardless of their Lawful-Chaotic alignment, would be doomed to failure simply by the very nature of them being evil.

That is why Lawful-Evil societies and groups can stand themselves, even if they want to murder every player not party to their circle.

Personally I would love to see the Red Mantis Assassin prestige class make a cameo, even if it was only in the form of Sawtoothed sabres being a viable weapon, just so there can be a guild of extremely professional assassins who refuse to kill monarchs or accept any contract that includes any components other than simply "assassinate".

Can anyone say... Dervish Dancer?

i believe they've mentioned that character/guild(etc) bank accounts are pretty much 100% safe, not amenable to somebody going up to a 'bank' building and robbing it.

They mentioned they have plans for characters to have access to 100% secure storage, but have made no comment about how much can be stored in that location.

If 100% secure storage turns out to be insufficient to hold all your gear/equipment, alternative storage will be needed.

They have made no comment about the organizational structure, or the security of, player or NPC run banks, making this conversation still valid.

Aligment is a measurement of your over-all values.

Telling one lie or back-stabbing one 'ally' isn't necessarily going to change your alignment... (unless you were already borderline)
Though such actions aren't contributing towards a Lawful alignment, if you are otherwise sufficiently Lawful, your Alignment will probably not change.
Claiming that Lawful Evil allies would never turn on each other (to claim the throne, etc.) because that's 'un-Lawful' is not something I believe anybody at Paizo would endorse. Sure, a character repeatedly doing so, i.e. not being able to exist with semi-stability within a Lawful order, would be grounds for being Chaotic, but one occasion isn't really enough to shift in most cases. Lawful societies do shift leaders somietimes, by violent means not specifically allowed by law.

A society as a whole can be lawful without necessarily requiring all of its members to be lawful.

My statements reflect the extreme ends of things. That is to say, a lawful nation run by Paladins of Iomedae, would never in a million years change its system of leadership in a way not authorized by the law without the influence of Chaotic Good characters.

If one of those paladins tried to overthrow the government, Iomedae would simply revoke her favor, leaving the former paladin about as useful as a fighter half his level.

I have to ask, what do you consider The Galactic Empire / The Sith Empire to be?

They have laws, order, codes of honor etc. I consider them almost the most perfect personification of lawful evil. Sure they murder eachother but they have laws about when and where that is appropriate.

Yet they are also the most infamous source of tearing each-other apart from within.

I would say the empire as a whole would have to be borderline Lawful/Neutral Evil.

I say this because while the organization may be Lawful Evil, its members cover the entire spectrum.

As such, the organization may punish inappropriate behavior, but a Chaotic Evil high ranking Sith could choose to ignore the law if they are particularly fond of a disciple.

Similarly, a Lawful Sith might punish their disciple for being too Chaotic in his attempts to gain more power.

There are also non-chaotic ways to go about backstabbing someone. For example tricking someone into bringing about their own demise can easily be done without ever lying or breaking a single rule. (Think of it like tricking someone into attacking you so you can kill them in self-defense).
It might not be lawful, but it certainly isn't chaotic.

Furthermore, power-struggle doesn't necessarily require backstabbing, it can simply be a matter of positioning yourself to take fullest advantage of other people's failings.

I doubt "flagged as a criminal" would be much of an issue; in most games, even those where you can go open-season on the 'red names' with no legal issues of your own, they don't get hunted anyways; those capable of dealing with those types are in their own damn guild anyhow, or about to be struck by several of them at a time. Unless there's real ['hardcore mode'] character consequences, you lose nothing doing this, and have everything to gain.

I would suggest you re-read the blogs about bounty hunting and criminal flags.

No character with a criminal flag can go anywhere near a good-oriented settlement without being set upon by NPC guards.

Assuming good characters store their goods in good-oriented banks, which are located in good-oriented towns, it becomes unrealistic for a rogue who gets caught and therefore flagged by the system to even get into the settlement where the bank is located, let alone rob it repeatedly without fear of consequence from that flag.

I don't know where you got "losing ten percent of your money every night" from.

Even if HALF the 4500 players in the entire game were rogues, that would still only be 2250 robberies a week.

There's no way 2250 robberies a week can possibly equal every character loses 10% a day.

Furthermore, you don't need a greyed out button if the DC to rob a bank goes up every time you break into it. After a certain point even a nat 20 doesn't succeed.

If that principle works in P&P, it can be transferred to PFO.

Besides, why would you grey out a button when you can instead let the rogues go ahead and keep trying on a 10% success chance until they flag themselves criminals for pushing their luck.

Evil societies will constantly be tearing themselves apart from within - such is the nature of evil. To advance their goals they'll be at each others throats.

Ryan, you seem to be forgetting that the concept of "evil tearing itself apart from within" is a cliche that only applies to the real world, not to the world of Golarion.

You are also making the common mistake of associating 'evil' with 'chaos'. Something that just isn't the case in this universe.

In a world of absolutes, it doesn't matter how evil you are, if you're lawful, you're not going to be backstabbing your allies.

No lawful evil character would ever go back on their word. If they did, they wouldn't be lawful. And with detect alignment spells abounding, it's childsplay for a guild of assassins to refuse chaotic members, and therefore maintain a degree of trust and loyalty to rival that of the paladins.

As an example proving my point, the Red Mantis Assasssins are required to be Lawful Evil in order to join. This faction, which Paizo placed in Golarion, contains absolutely no in-fighting despite being evil.

How is that superior to letting the character decide how many different abilities they want to have available, and dividing their available training time among them?

If we assume that PFO will work by allowing us to gain any ability we want, and equip all the abilities we've learned, then there's an inherent limit based on how much you can train. If I try to train up 20 different abilities at once, and you only train 5 or 6, you will be more skilled at those 5 or 6 than I am at those 20. There's no need for an additional limitation.

Because if you have 2 characters, both Rogue20/Fighter20

And in terms of abilities learned they are identical, I think it makes a decent amount of sense for the one who, in game, uses certain abilities more often would be better practiced with them.

It gives players who are otherwise equal, an incentive to have their 'infinitely trainable' character specialize and not just have 100's of abilities on your bar all at once.

Because like I said, while it's realistic for a character to always know how to do everything he's ever learned, the one that knows how to do 100 things, and practices them all equally, is going to be less skilled than one that knows 100 things and practices 20 of them diligently.

With the way most MMO's handle jumping and walking on slopes, there are numerous areas where players, even without any sort of climb mechanic, end up in locations they aren't supposed to get to.

In general, with how collision detection works for letting players jump from one platform to another, I don't think it'd be too complicated to have a secondary detector for if the middle of their upper body collides with the edge, allowing them to pull themselves up.

Obviously how high on their character model the platform edge hits would be controlled by their jump skill and by feasibility.

Furthermore, rather than having specifically climbable locations, if all near-vertical surfaces had a climb difficulty, then only characters sufficiently adept at climbing would enter into a vertical 'climbing' animation, and be allowed to scale.

You could even include things where if the character's skill is close to the borderline then every certain amount of distance they have a chance of falling. (This fall chance could be reduced by having ropes/other climbing gear equipped)

And in regards to making it so players can't get to places they're not supposed to, most other games handle it by making terrain that has a slope that is too steep to climb (And still sometimes players get around it by running tangent to the gradient on an impossibly steep surface).

The terrain of the game would just need to be designed with the fact that some characters will be able to go up very steep slopes.
(Of course perfectly smooth surfaces would still be unclimbable, and surfaces that have an angle beyond vertical would likewise be impossible.)

If there is ANY intent for flight based spells/mechanics to ever make it into the game, I think it's only fair to include some sort of climbing mechanism to allow martial characters to reach similar areas.

I doubt they're going to be putting in Psionics as that was entirely 3rd party material. Even if it is balanced, it doesn't currently have an actual place in Golarion.

I know my post is like a million lines long but I wish people would at least look at the TL;DR at the bottom : /

I have yet to see someone point out a specific flaw with either my system or a variation of my system that has been balanced.

The bard should be like an 80's rock band. Strum a chord... SQUIBALEDOO... your enemies head explodes.

Though seriously, a bard should be a must-have for any serious adventuring group, their buff/debuff auras should make them invaluable.

The only thing i didn't like about bards when playing NWN was that they never gained access to high level spells. Personally i would like bards to have their own spell tree intertwined with their music that rivals other spell trees. And then Ryan's guitar analogy can have foundation in the game.

Ultimate magic added some pretty awesome bard spells.

Chord of Shards (1st level spell) 2d6 damage in a 15 ft cone (reflex negates)

Ki Shout (as the 7th level wizard spell)

Shadowbard (5th level) allows you to have a bardic performance going without spending daily uses of it. Stacks with your own performance as long as the bonuses are different.

Overwhelming Presence (as the 9th level wizard spell)

Dance of a thousand cuts - +5 to hit, +5 damage, +5 acrobatics, +5 AC, +haste. (Unfortunately this one is only to you, but if you're playing a dervish bard, it's pretty nice)

@DeciusBrutus: If you had a right to kill someone, and you did it for hire, that would not be an evil act. However, the system I am envisioning for "Assasination" would involve some supernatural component (thus the "worse than death" aspect). The use of that component will be an inherently evil act.

So we're talking "Angel of Death(Su)" (from the Assassin archetype) or something similar then?

Because if assassination isn't just 'kill the target', then that makes sense.

It also adds some meaning to 'killing' someone in a world where dying leaves you with your equipped gear and you just respawn.

However, I did have a question about 'non-lethal' weapons and their potential appearance in the game.

Is there going to be any way to knock someone unconscious (0 hp) without killing them?

For example, if a bandit ambushes a caravan, knocks everyone out, steals their supplies, and leaves them on the road, he still will have committed a crime, but not murder.

Could bandits guilty of thievery but not murder have bounties placed on their head (with the stipulation that the bandit be left alive, and merely require a return of either the goods or some coin equivalent?)

I'd love to have a guy running around with invisibility and using crowd control songs.

I don't know if songs break invis in the core rules, but they don't when using the rules I've played by.

In any case, fascinated backs are so much easier to stab.

While technically bardic performance doesn't break invisibility, you have to be visible in order to fascinate someone.

Additionally, bardic performances that target foes /would/ break invisibility. You could however be an invisible buffer.

On a serious note, Asmodeus has contracts in his portfolio. How is establishing a contract, by either party, not inherintly evil?

Because that's not how portfolios work.

Asmodeus' obsession with contracts is because he's lawful, and is completely separate from the fact that he is evil.

It's the portfolios of Tyranny, Slavery, and Pride that make him evil.

If you'll notice, he also has the Law domain, which he shares with Iomedae because both are Lawful deities.

Can't res...ist...try...no...dam..n...I will bite...

No where is that union explicit and in fact other post suggest that the union you proposed is illogical. Assassins are evil doers, how can they bring justice short of seppuku?

Back to the fun with logic:

"Some chartered companies will be guilds of assassins".
and/or (hence my previous claim of lack of exclusivity)
"Some chartered companies may bring swift justice to evildoers"
Therefore, since "or" is the only semantically logical combination,
"Some guilds will be assassins or may bring swift justice to evildoers"
I make no claims about mercs, if I hire a merc group to assist in my war, they would be fighting in war and subject to the "acts of war" exclusion.
"Some guilds of mercenaries may bring swift justice to evildoers"

Forcing an "and" in there is just disingenuous.

Thank you for biting. :p

I agree with your assessment of the semantically logical combination of the two statements.

I believe part of the reason a "Some guilds of assassins may bring swift justice to evildoers" is being met with such scorn is that while it is logically sound, one of the premises it is built upon is flawed.

Namely that anything an assassin can do could ever be considered 'justice'.

Whether or not the target the assassin was hired to kill is evil, the assassination can't in any way be considered 'justice'. (Especially not in the eyes of Iomedae)

@Obaka, I sincerely hope that it was the fact that my post appeared at the bottom of a page that is causing you to not respond to it, and not a conscious choice. Because if it's the latter, then you are not only insulting people's intelligence and understanding of the English language, you are then unable or unwilling to back up your assertions when asked for an explanation.
I'm not trying to be antagonistic, I merely fail to see where your rather supercilious explanation of English finds its beef with Blaeringr's interpretation that a guild of assassins is capable of punishing evildoers.

On the topic of either:
"each of two; the one and the other"

"Both a sword and a dagger are weapons. Either can kill a man."
turning into
"Both a mercenary group and a guild of assassins are examples of chartered companies. Either can punish evildoers."

Moving past that, I would like to say that many people in this thread have raised their numerous concerns about assassination and it's consequences, and while there is obvious disagreement about things, we know with certainty that this highly debated topic will be addressed in more specific detail by Ryan.

At this point, it's only fair to stop bickering about meanings and intent until further clarification is delivered to us via the blog.

(That is not to say stop asking questions and raising points, but in-fighting about what someone did or didn't mean or imply is counter-productive to the development of a game we can all enjoy)

the previously named noun as the subject by default... in this case "companies" adjective "chartered".

Let's play replace the pronouns:

Some chartered companies will become world renowned. Some chartered companies may be mercenaries called in to tip the balance of a fight, or a guild of assassins that strikes fear into any who are marked for death. Some chartered companies may enforce the law, tracking down criminals and bringing swift justice to the evildoers.

Now for some logic fun:

"Some chartered companies will be guilds of assassins".
and
"Some chartered companies may bring swift justice to evildoers"
Therefore, via transitivity,
"Some guilds of assassins may bring swift justice to evildoers"
and
"Some guilds of mercenaries may bring swift justice to evildoers"

Now could you kindly explain to me how this:

They may be mercenaries.

They may be assassins.

Either may bring swift justice to evildoers.

Is not exactly the same as the union of the two logical statements

"Some guilds of assassins may bring swift justice to evildoers"
and
"Some guilds of mercenaries may bring swift justice to evildoers"

In war it is often a fight over something else, and both sides are usually claiming self defense...as such, you are allowed to defend what you hold.

I think this is actually a very important thing to be considered.

If a large group of evil PC's are about to lay waste to a 'good' settlement, are they at war? or are they all about to become criminals?

If they are at war they to address the concerns of "self defense" the good aligned settlement WOULD in fact be allowed to attack first, as killing during war is allowed.

Assassinating someone who is in the middle of a war?

If you are contracted by a company at war with another company, you should get the benefits of your employer - Namely that you can kill those you're at war with 'legally'.

In that situation, an assassin killing a leader in a war would be neither criminal, nor necessarily evil.

For example, if killing an evil dictator in the middle of a war was still an evil act, a true netural assassin would simply carry out his assassination without the use of the in-game contract system. He would legally be allowed to kill his target, and would not suffer an alignment shift because of it.

If the assassination contract system is intended to actually be used, assassinating a war-target cannot be an inherently evil act, or else the assassination contract system will not be used for those targets.