Goblin Squad Member
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Lower the scale a bit:
If a LG Paladin is trying to collect medicine to save a little girl's life and the only salve he can get to the girl in time belongs to a farmer who's own daughter is dying of the same illness, is he going to murder the farmer for it? Or is he going to try to find another solution?
This is extreme, but it seems you are only tweaking the scale when you talk about kingdoms going to war over resources.
Similar examples were brought up when discussing the relativity of morality. I'm too lazy to link the thread, but this isn't new.
In the real world, you're right. In coding a video game, no.
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CEO, Goblinworks
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I find alignment debates sooooo boring. Can we end this one? I think Blaeringr's original mischaracterization of our statements about murder outside of NPC settlements is now thoroughly corrected. Debating alignment in relation to real world people or events is pointless as we do not live in a universe constructed by a pantheon of squabbling gods who regularly manifest to give their disciples explicit directions as to this desires, nor is our universe imbued with absolute moral fibers - unlike Golarion, which was and is.
Goblinworks Executive Founder
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Views on what is good and what isn't good is really irrelevant we aren't debating morale philosophy we are debating whether a LG entity would kill another LG entity because that LG entity had something they wanted. This would and should not be the case.
See the specific example provided by Beilian. I would think a LG paladin isn't going to kill the farmer who for all intents and purposes is good, he's going to try and find another way to fix the problem.
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Goblin Squad Member
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There is a massive difference between Good being subjective and Good being your Post-Modern opinion of it, especially when you drag the gods into it. There's your reason, a LG Paladin will go to war because he believes his god wills it. Iomedae IS the god of Valor, Honor, and Justice, all the justifications you just called a joke. But as for Good in general, did Ryan say exactly what good was? If not, I'd still say you are being presumptuous.Not me - Ryan. That is Goblinworks; stance. I've already told you that a couple times in this thread. If you're too sleepy to read my posts accurately then I'd be pleased to continue this tomorrow.
We had a big discussion a while back about how good and evil could be relative and interpreted differently by different religions or just different people, and Ryan brought the hammer down on that.
I didn't call honor and justice a joke, I called the medieval version of them a joke. And Imodae is the god of ACTUAL valor, honor and justice, not of presumptuous nobles using those words to justify horrible violence and suffering to satisfy their greed.
@Jameow It is indeed me saying that. But even you must concede that all your arguments are about things that are not the norm but exceptions. All your examples require twisting and playing antics with the semantics of good.
If you agree that being of a good alignment should include compassion and consideration for the other party, then your point is moot as you must concede that you are just looking for relative and ambiguous exceptions.
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Goblin Squad Member
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So you're assuming I can't place a 1 coin bounty on you just so my chartered company can kill you over and over wherever and whenever they want without consequences. And if they place a minimum amount, then my buddies can just reimburse me the cost each time to make sure they can keep having their fun hunting you.This opposition to bounties relies on the assumption that everyone will just keep putting bounties I. You over and over, costing money, and they those bounties will be worth hunting you down for. Why would they be? Unless you killed a really wealthy merchant, and they probably have better things to do than kill you over and over. Remember you don't actually get anything back for a bounty, just put a price on someone's head.
It adds weight to decision to murder someone.And if there's a known griefer provoking people into attacking him, who will take the bounty on someone with a good reputation? People who do are likely to lose reputation for being a lowly mercenary.
Exactly being in a good aligned clan I KNOW how I would use this. Infact I know how I WILL ask everyone to use the bounty system right now.
Please give all players who randomly kill you a bounty set for The Empyrean Order to collect. We appreciate higher bounty amounts but most of us (I know I will anyway) will collect the minimum amount required to post it.
Because of this unlimited bounty postings are pretty overpowered. There needs to be a limit. I say 5-10. And I agree some area should be lawless. Areas controlled by chaotic player nations should not have the bounty mechanic.
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Goblin Squad Member
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You don't see how Imedae would rather you focus your effort on defending the innocent than on lawyering up reasons to bash them over the head? Ok, fair enough, but that doesn't mean Imedae is as blind to what good really means as some of her self-important followers might be.
WHO is doing the attacking? It isn't the goddess, it IS her followers. Unless you expect her to come down in game and tell them to stop?
Part of her focus is rooting out evil. All the motivations I put forward were rooting out evil.
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Goblin Squad Member
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One only has to believe someone is evil to attack them for it, or that they are misguided, or that it is for "the greater good".
But that is relativism and, as Ryan just told you, only works in a world where the gods aren't actually telling you what good and evil is. It only works in a world where the spell detect alignment doesn't exist. And compassion and cooperation, even in the real world, do far more for "the greater good" then unyielding foolishness. In fact Darwin explained how those two points were essential for all species at least as much as competition.
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Goblin Squad Member
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ARE the gods telling you what to do? I havn't seen a mechanic for it. For every act are you going to get an alert that says "Iomedae says this is an evil act! Are you sure you want to continue?"
Is it impossible for a paladin to be deceived by a demon?
Detect Alignment is great... If you have it.
It isn't relativism. It is the difference between knowing something and believing you know something.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Read this post:
I find alignment debates sooooo boring. Can we end this one? I think Blaeringr's original mischaracterization of our statements about murder outside of NPC settlements is now thoroughly corrected. Debating alignment in relation to real world people or events is pointless as we do not live in a universe constructed by a pantheon of squabbling gods who regularly manifest to give their disciples explicit directions as to this desires, nor is our universe imbued with absolute moral fibers - unlike Golarion, which was and is.
It's not the first time he's said this. And for a settlement to go to war without making every effort to determine if they're beliefs are true is not lawful good - it's lawful ignorant.
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Goblin Squad Member
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It isn't relativism. It is the difference between knowing something and believing you know something.
And now you're no longer talking about lawful good. You're talking about lawful ignorant.
Someone who is good will not make quick assumptions where war is involved. Good means patience, compassion, and giving the benefit of the doubt.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Only if the mechanics say that LG can't go to war with LG. As far as I have heard so far, this mechanic does not exist.
This argument was never about whether those mechanics exist: it was about whether it would make sense for LG to go to war with LG.
And I know that you know that.
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Goblin Squad Member
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It isn't relativism. It is the difference between knowing something and believing you know something.And now you're no longer talking about lawful good. You're talking about lawful ignorant.
Someone who is good will not make quick assumptions where war is involved. Good means patience, compassion, and giving the benefit of the doubt.
Bingo. The character or City Leadership is Lawful Good. That doesn't mean they always make the right decision. That doesn't mean they AREN'T lawful good. Despite the law of the world, there will not be a GM sitting around telling players what this god or that god thinks whenever they have to make a decision about something.
We can talk about hypothetical situations all night, but wars will happen between Lawful Good kingdoms.
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Goblin Squad Member
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And when the make the wrong decision, their alignment shifts. You can't admit it was the wrong decision for their alignment but call it also in line with said alignment.
I have already said that I agree wars will happen between LG. It should cause an alignment shift though because it is not a LG action.
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Goblin Squad Member
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What we find out will depend on what GW decides, not on the actual truth of the matter.
For the record, if we were talking about real world wars rather than players squabbling over resources that are just about making their settlement mightier, but over food and stopping the starvation of the people, then I think we'd find a lot more to agree about. But it's hard to accept that kind of relativism when talking about digital gold mines for make believe swords.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Not at all, it's much easier to justify going to war when no one actually gets hurt over a resource that doesn't actually exist. In the end you do it for FUN and who cares about how true it is to the lore. If you're surrounded by LG towns and want someone you fight, chances are you'll fight a neighbour. Towns will come to agreements about wars for their own amusement like they always have, then come up with an RP reason for it.
It comes down to mechanics in the end. The arbitrary rule of the gods is not the arbitrary rule of the gods, it's which way the devs decide to set it, and that's largely dependent on how it's used.
If LG towns start randomly demolishing eachother and causing big disruptions to how the game is meant to go, they'd probably start putting in alignment hits for it.
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I am seeing something wrong here ??
As an evil player planning on being a bandit/assassin, this last weeks discussions <settlements, reputation, alignment and PvP> have bugged me. Heres my scenario.
So now I am out in the wilderness, where I am assuming wilderness means not under any ones law, and scope out a resource to ambush people at. So in comes Nihimon. I swoop in and kill him. I am whacked with reputation loss and alignment shift towards evil and chaos. Nihimon takes out the 10g bounty on me. Now I am labeled as a murderer and can't go in any lawful towns, or any good ones. So now I am left to CE, NE, or TN towns. Nihimon just happens to be rich, so i continuously have a bounty on me, and keep being killed and losing equipment. Not being good or lawful aligned, I don't get access to higher quality training/goods/services of those types of settlements. So now I have sub-par equipment and training, and every one can keep killing me. Why in the hell would any one be evil in this game ??
I understand that evil need to be reigned in, but it also needs a fighting chance or it will cease to exist. With out evil, there is no good. with out darkness, there is no light.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I am seeing something wrong here ??
As an evil player planning on being a bandit/assassin, this last weeks discussions <settlements, reputation, alignment and PvP> have bugged me. Heres my scenario.
So now I am out in the wilderness, where I am assuming wilderness means not under any ones law, and scope out a resource to ambush people at. So in comes Nihimon. I swoop in and kill him. I am whacked with reputation loss and alignment shift towards evil and chaos. Nihimon takes out the 10g bounty on me. Now I am labeled as a murderer and can't go in any lawful towns, or any good ones. So now I am left to CE, NE, or TN towns. Nihimon just happens to be rich, so i continuously have a bounty on me, and keep being killed and losing equipment. Not being good or lawful aligned, I don't get access to higher quality training/goods/services of those types of settlements. So now I have sub-par equipment and training, and every one can keep killing me. Why in the hell would any one be evil in this game ??
I understand that evil need to be reigned in, but it also needs a fighting chance or it will cease to exist. With out evil, there is no good. with out darkness, there is no light.
Chaotic is penalised much more than evil, so if you try to stick to lawful evil, I think, as it stands, you should be ok. I think the aim is to reduce the criminal element and encourage conflict through factional dispute... I THINK that includes good vs evil, so you might be alright after all.
As an assassin, you can take contracts anyway ;)
That's my interpretation anyway.
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Goblinworks Executive Founder
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To clarify, everything I have read leans toward a system the heavily discourages CE, really focusing on the chaotic aspect.
As has been pointed out in many other discussions about alignment very few people are going to be CE. These are people who randomly murder people for no particular reason.
I don't see bandits/assassins falling into CE generally, more than likely they will fall into LE or NE.
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Goblin Squad Member
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assassin can be lawful evil which will be the most efficient type of evil settlements but, not the only type of evil settlements. Assuming that NE people can enter those settlements unless you go fully chaotic I doubt you will have any trouble getting the skills and equipment you need. Even then if there is a NE or CE settlement you should be OK with getting in there as well. At least to my understanding.
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Goblinworks Executive Founder
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Toll roads and ransoms aren't really Chaotic in my opinon it isn't something you just do on a whim you pre-plan to setup a toll road or you have the forethought to plan a ransom to get better gain then simply killing the person and taking what they have right there and then.
To me CE is truly "La la la, oh a person... KILL KILL."
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Goblin Squad Member
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I didn't call honor and justice a joke, I called the medieval version of them a joke.
...
This 'calling' of yours, to be true, requires that your understanding of Honor and Justice is absolute, and that your understanding of these is not ethnocentric.
Are you certain you can rightly claim that the medieval understanding of honor and justice were incorrect, and even laughable?
For millenia civilization has struggled mightily to understand and codify these ideals. If you actually have such godlike knowledge you do us wrong to keep them to yourself. You should publish at your earliest convenience.
Or are you, perhaps, opining in all-too-human hubris?
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Goblin Squad Member
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I didn't call honor and justice a joke, I called the medieval version of them a joke.
...This 'calling' of yours, to be true, requires that your understanding of Honor and Justice is absolute, and that your understanding of these is not ethnocentric.
Are you certain you can rightly claim that the medieval understanding of honor and justice were incorrect, and even laughable?
For millenia civilization has struggled mightily to understand and codify these ideals. If you actually have such godlike knowledge you do us wrong to keep them to yourself. You should publish at your earliest convenience.
Or are you, perhaps, opining in all-too-human hubris?
The difference is not that my knowledge is better, the difference is that the "honor" and "justice" of the medieval ages were just transparent catch phrases to justify openly greedy actions. The people using the words knew better. And when the peasants pointed out that they too knew better, they got killed.
That's why we have the Magna Carta today. That document was all about reigning in the rampant "honor" of the king, and making "justice" less of a mockery.
You can't ignore that much history, say you have a point, then accuse someone else of hubris. That's absurd. Go read a history book or two before trying to defend medieval quasi-morality.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I didn't call honor and justice a joke, I called the medieval version of them a joke.
...This 'calling' of yours, to be true, requires that your understanding of Honor and Justice is absolute, and that your understanding of these is not ethnocentric.
Are you certain you can rightly claim that the medieval understanding of honor and justice were incorrect, and even laughable?
For millenia civilization has struggled mightily to understand and codify these ideals. If you actually have such godlike knowledge you do us wrong to keep them to yourself. You should publish at your earliest convenience.
Or are you, perhaps, opining in all-too-human hubris?
The difference is not that my knowledge is better, the difference is that the "honor" and "justice" of the medieval ages were just transparent catch phrases to justify openly greedy actions. The people using the words knew better. And when the peasants pointed out that they too knew better, they got killed.
That's why we have the Magna Carta today. That document was all about reigning in the rampant "honor" of the king, and making "justice" less of a mockery.
You can't ignore that much history, say you have a point, then accuse someone else of hubris. That's absurd. Go read a history book or two before trying to defend medieval quasi-morality.
Oh, I'd say I have read a bit of history, thank you sir for the recommendation. However I would further recommend to you that gross generalizations of individuals of any age is very similar to prejudice, and utterly inaccurate. Take your complaint to Thomas Aquinas and see yourself as you are.
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Goblin Squad Member
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You point out the exceptions, but that just strengthens my point: there were individuals who recognized true morality - it's not just our modern concept. But by and large, the history books are full of leaders completely ignoring those great thinkers and doing what they wanted in their own selfish pursuits. On occasion one might quote one of those philosophers of morality, but take it out of context to reinforce their hunger for wealth and power.
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Goblin Squad Member
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You point out the exceptions, but that just strengthens my point: there were individuals who recognized true morality - it's not just our modern concept. But by and large, the history books are full of leaders completely ignoring those great thinkers and doing what they wanted in their own selfish pursuits. On occasion one might quote one of those philosophers of morality, but take it out of context to reinforce their hunger for wealth and power.
Yet the ideals enshrined in your Magna Carta did not spring full grown fom the brows of the Nobles, having never existed prior. Those Nobles were taught these things. Justice and Honor was not a joke then, nor is it now, so be Just yourself. For my part: Shouldn't we accept that your intended statement was mispoken when you asserted these ideals were a 'joke' in medieval times for simplicity?
Or will you affirm the ruled of hubris?
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Goblin Squad Member
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Wait! Wait! Stop your arguing! I have a compromise!
Max times a bounty can be set when killed in......
Guarded areas near starter towns: Unlimited
Lawful-Good Player Territory: 10
Neutral-Good / Lawful Neutral: 7
True Neutral: 5
Chaotic Good / Lawful Evil: 3
Neutral Evil / Chaotic Neutral / Unclaimed: 1
Chaotic Evil: 0
Numbers are debatable, but thoughts on the general system?
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Goblin Squad Member
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The ideals as practiced on the national level were a joke. That's all I've been getting at all along.
Yes, I agree that many understood better than those in power were practicing, but the context of the conversation you leaped into was one of political actions and nobles using honor to, as another person in this thread wrote, elevate themselves socially and economically.
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Goblin Squad Member
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@Ryan
I'm not particularly freaked out by the bounty change thing, myself, but to be fair...
"Killing an opponent as a part of a declared war, or in an area that does not have laws against murder, will not trigger the bounty system."
... pretty clearly implies that there ARE lawless areas in the game where killing does not trigger the bounty system.
Players are also naturaly going assume that unclaimed wilderness areas are ones without laws. In order for there to be a law there has to be some lawfull authority to exert that law...that's pretty much axiomatic... as is the concept that there would be no lawfull authority to exert said laws in UNCLAIMED wilderness.
Now, you guys have said pretty much every time you've posted that things you discuss are subject to change, as is natural for a game in development. So it's no shocker to me when things that were stated in past blogs do change and I don't personaly see it as that big of a change...but it clearly is a change and it has certainly caught some folks off-guard.
I think most folks who had been following the blogs had the impresion upto now that unclaimed wilderness was pretty much the Wild West as far as PvP goes, I know I did.
PS. At this point I'm not sure how you get much PvP going in the game. War's have to be consentual...banditry and killing out in the Wild seems to be getting equated with "griefing"....so where's the PvP come from?
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Goblin Squad Member
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... banditry and killing out in the Wild seems to be getting equated with "griefing"...I think that's wildly inaccurate.
"Griefing" will result in bans.
Banditry and Killing in the Wilderness will not.
Drawing that from this portion of Ryan's first response in the thread Nihimon....
" We may declare that a substantial area territory has a "law against murder", and we might change that over time to reflect how the community is playing the game and how much problem we're having with griefers. "
... I may be reading too much into that last statement, but that's the impression I got from it.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Wait! Wait! Stop your arguing! I have a compromise!
Max times a bounty can be set when killed in......
Guarded areas near starter towns: Unlimited
Lawful-Good Player Territory: 10
Neutral-Good / Lawful Neutral: 7
True Neutral: 5
Chaotic Good / Lawful Evil: 3
Neutral Evil / Chaotic Neutral / Unclaimed: 1
Chaotic Evil: 0Numbers are debatable, but thoughts on the general system?
Sounds good to me. Thisq would certainly support a different "feel" for each pf the areas that I like. It would also provide for tweaking the numbers based on real experience, if needed.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Weighing in as an interested newcomer to PFO after two years away from theme-park MMO's with PvP as a sideline event, it seems that the Bounty system in nearly all areas (not just protected "civilized" areas) would be an interesting add to gameplay. In other words not simply used as an anti-griefing tool to squelch open PvP, but a strategy by trade or exploration groups to level the playing field versus crack PvP squads they can't come close to besting in the zone (and assuming they tried out there and failed).
Agreed though that the Bounty system should require some combination of cost and time/quantity limitations so that it is meaningful. After all, the 'victims' should have some skin in the game if they are going to employ that as a strategy. Perhaps minimum cost thresholds cuts against supply-and-demand of a virtual economy, but it seems reasonable the bounty has to have a worthwhile price and be relevant to a recent event. Otherwise, you could see weaker characters running around as skirmish 'bait' to get PvP squads flagged, ready on audio to give out location info and execute that paltry 1 coin contact. That seems to be against meaningful interaction as much as the "see you kill you" scenario.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Griefing
Players' definitions of griefing lie on a continuum, as Blaeringr so aptly points out (with a great illustration of such a continuum), which is why this term is almost meaningless in discussion.
As we have seen in the PvP threads, some players believe that being killed even once in the wilderness by a random player is 'griefing'.
Some players wouldn't consider a game 'griefer friendly' until it is once per week/day/hour.
Almost everybody can agree that a game is 'griefer friendly' if one player can kill another player over and over with little consequence.
Some players require that all actions on Blaeringr's continuum be available to them in an "Open FFA PvP" environment. Those players are griefers by any definition, and left the community a year ago when Ryan announced the bounty system and that GW would ban players for griefing.
Ryan Dancey made a post defining griefing which seems to have no effect on how people are using the term. Let's ditch the term and talk about actions, please.
Open World PvP
I think I can say that players attracted to an "Open PvP" world expect FFA PvP (random player killing) to be commonplace (not necessarily that griefing be commonplace). Actually, I think everybody's expectation is that an Open PvP world has commonplace FFA PvP, regardless of whether they like it or not, considering the reactions in the PvP threads to GW's use of the term.
This is perhaps why when this game was still in the planning stages and it was being designed as an Open PvP world, many of us believed that the bounty system described by these two sentences:
When you are murdered—that is, killed unlawfully—you will have the option to place a bounty on your killer's head... Bounties can only be issued when a character unlawfully kills another. Killing an opponent as a part of a declared war, or in an area that does not have laws against murder, will not trigger the bounty system.
Was one of limited scope, with the intent to deter griefing. Actually, I think that most of us believed that at that time a year ago.
As we realize now (or earlier, as Nihimon & others did), we should have put more emphasis on the next sentence:
The intent is to deter characters from arbitrarily attacking and killing others simply for fun.
Goblinworks never 'changed their stance,' they simply confirmed an area where bounties would be applicable a year ago, and now they confirmed that that area was larger than many of us assumed, based on an idea of what "Open PvP World" meant (admittedly, an idea shared by the majority of players, PvPers and PvEers both). We still don't know exactly how much larger the scope of bounties is, as explained by Ryan.
Not that it even matters if they changed their minds or not: We were told constantly and consistently that things will change.
Until 2-3 weeks ago before the devs made a few posts detailing alignment shifts, reputation loss, and death-curses, I believed FFA PvP would be commonplace when not in a hex adjacent to a settlement. After that, I made a post here followed up by another post about my disappointment with the direction the game was heading.
After awhile and a few discussions, I softened my concerns, though I still felt that FFA PvP and Chaotic characters and settlements (even CE) had a prominent and important place in the game. I had these concerns. I wondered if a system designed more along these lines would be more interesting/fun.
I feel that the system described above in order to deal with Random Player Killing was acceptable, even if it wasn't exactly what I hoped for. I imagined it like this:
In the wilds
LG:
An LG player would exhaust all options to resolve a situation before resorting to violence (he wants to keep the alignment he works hard for), but had the threat of violence to back up his claims and would use it if necessary in cases where the he judged the cost was less than the benefit.
In almost every case, this player would not attack another player for their gear/inventory; the hit to alignment would be too great to risk getting worthless random loot.
Neutral-ish:
A neutral player would probably resort to violence a little more quickly , since he/she is only trying to maintain a neutral rep, rather than reach the pinnacle of LG-ness. In absolute terms, I imagined that the shift in his/her alignment would be less than that of the LG player.
In terms of unprovoked aggression, this character may see a character decked out in some great armor in a weakened state and decide to attack. They figure that the small chance that they receive a piece of the great armor is worth the cost of the alignment shift. The risk is that they don't get the armor and that they might die.
CE:
A CE player would get that way by killing every person that might have something valuable that they thought they could beat. He would be the typical 'ganker', probably running with a small group of friends. They would be actively searching for people to kill, stalking them, and waiting to attack at the most opportune moment.
Very quickly, he would realize that he wasn't getting very much good loot for his time, especially after divvying it up. He and his friends could probably make more coin by clearing dungeons or maintaining a harvesting operation. It's not a big deal; PvP is fun! They continue until they reach CE alignment.
Life is starting to not be fun. The only settlement they can join without being KOS is a wretched hive of scum and villiany. The taxes their settlement collects are severely reduced by NPC graft, draining CE players' pockets and settlement coffers. Even if they could collect enough revenue, they can't upgrade the infrastructure in the settlement. They can't train many of the skills they want due to the lack of infrastructure.
They start wasting more time dying from failed ambushes and trying to find targets they can actually kill in their weakened state. The harvesters and adventurers they used to gank have bought better gear for lower prices than the shoddy gear available in their CE settlement. They realize that focusing on 'ganking' is not a viable strategy.
They either reroll characters, or they climb the long hill back to acceptable society. They change their mindset to that of a Neutral-ish.
New bounty information
With the new bounty information, we also got the new blogpost. In it, we learned that we would now no longer receive a 'random selection' of loot from a player's husk, but rather that we would be able to choose from his/her inventory and unthreaded equipment. We also learned that carrying capacity would be limited by an encumbrance mechanic (weight). Keep in mind that previous to this post there was still equipment that was unlootable, is was just that you didn't choose which equipment that was.
This changes the dynamic that I explained in my above example:
Now, when a player sees another with great armor, the player knows he can take as many pieces as he can carry if he loots that player.
That player also must realize that the 'rich' player he is targeting for the guaranteed 'big score' (assuming he successfully kills him, or waits until he dies from PvE and runs up to loot his corpse) can place a bounty contract on him. Since he is rich, he likely will, and he likely has contacts that will be able to fulfill a bounty contract.
A 'ganker,' on the other hand, now gets to choose all the best loot from all of his many targets. Instead of placing extra value on 'rich' targets that he has better chance of getting a piece of valuable loot, he can target a multitude of easy targets (new players) and get the same payoff by taking their most valuable unthreaded equipment (not much, if they are new players) and especially the most valuable items in their inventory (recently harvested materials, likely).
Final Thoughts
The elegance of the system as I imagined previously was that even if a ganker saw a group of people mining the most valuable ore in golarion, they would have no guarantee of getting a big payoff if they attacked.
Yes, when repeated, they would eventually end up with some nice loot after they put in all the time and risk of finding and engaging these targets. But, when repeated, they incur the alignment and reputation costs every time, and in the long run the total payoff would not account for the total cost, as they become less and less able to leverage their gains into real benefits.
I also think that having unlimited bounties for crimes committed in a small portion of the game is the way to go. That way, Random Player Killing in these areas is severely punished, forever, if the victim chooses. I imagine many LG players, anti-griefers, and anti-RPKers will be more than happy to donate money to a victim of this behavior in exchange for the bounty contract that the victim applies it to. In this way, bounties are a powerful deterrent; especially when paired with death-curses, which can be applied in either case.
I think it's pretty clear that we see problems with the bounty system as described a year ago applied in the manner we were told yesterday. I don't doubt that the development team has already changed the bounty system (or simply has details we aren't privvy to) in order to fit the goal they have in mind; probably even before they released the information about the scope of bounties.
I hope we can get some more information about bounties soon so I can get a better idea of what life in the River Kingdoms will be like, and what the incentives and disincentives for Random Player Killing will be.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Distance: Your character will respawn at a designated place when it dies. As your alignment worsens you'll find the selection of places where you can respawn becoming more and more limited, and those places are likely to be further and further from the potential targets that you've selected. That means that you'll have to traverse a lot of distance to get back to wherever it is that you're trying to hunt, and that exposes you to the danger of moving through the game world without a lot of gear to help you survive.
We also don't intend to let characters have any real PvP capabilities "naked". You'll have to wear some kind of protection, have to use some kind of consumable, and generally be burning economic assets of some kind when you fight other players. So there will always be a cost to engage in PvP. You won't be able to run up to a character wearing nothing and stab your target to death with a newbie dagger.
Also there is a layered series of "defenses" as well.
This is another GREAT, FUN way to discourage overactive Random Player Killers but not discourage a person from randomly killing A player (whether unprovoked or otherwise).
Also note that in that same post, the plan seems to be to have bounties remain infinitely appliable. What caveats go with that, we don't yet know.
My two biggest worries concerning this topic is the unlimited bounties, and evil not having access to the things needed to continue to exist. Andius' idea on the limited bounties is great. Added to that should be a way to check the consequences of attacking the target. Say an observation check that tells yous rep loss and alignment shift, what tags you will receive for attacking. The result should be based on your characters abilities.
Me being evil, trying to stay towards lawful so I can be competitive, do an risk assessment on Nihimon before killing him. My character abilities <observation, lore:local, etc.> tells me, we are in unclaimed wilderness, so its not unlawful. His alignment is NG, so alignment sift is minimal. His settlement is opposed to mine, so rep loss is also minimal. The approximate value I see him carrying is 200g. So I decide the reward is worth the risk and kill Nihimon, again.
Come to find out, my lore:local wasn't high enough and this land is claimed and I am now tagged as a murderer. Nihimon, being a smart guy has made sure most of his equipment is not able to be looted. So I gain only 50g worth of stuff. And he has put out a bounty. Also, being as I killed him here before, he puts a death curse on me. His buddy was following behind and finishes me off. I lose most my stuff.
Now all this is acceptable, assuming I can do the risk assessment, bounties are limited, and there is a way for me to replace my equipment. There needs to be a balance. I can deal with LG settlements and characters have a little better quality of equipment etc. as long as it real tough to maintain the alignment. The rest need to be equal IMO.