Does anyone get it???

[Dalec]

Paxx this forum is to discuss PVP idea\'s, so if you don\'t like them just ignore them. Just like the wish list, not all idea\'s are going to be implemented in game. Anyway, to make a good RPG, you need a whole lot of choices. If you are a rogue or bandit and you can\'t mug anyone and take something of theirs, what fun is it being a rogue? I am not a huge supporter of PK, as I don\'t like griefers anyway. But there have been more than enough idea\'s to severely punish griefers and the sort. Bottom line, this is a forum about PK. Expect to see new idea\'s tossed into the air in hopes that maybe the devs will change their minds, don\'t get upset because of it.

[derwoodly]

Dalec,

Be nice Paxx is on our side.  He wants PvP in PS.

[Dalec]

derwoodly,

What did I say that was not nice to Paxx? I only stated that this forum is used to talk about PVP and Thieving ideas so he should not get mad reading about new ideas in this forum. If anyone wasn\'t being nice it was Paxx for trying to not let us post new ideas about PVP and Thieving - whether they can be implemented or not.

[Bytecon]

Just some things of the top of my head for thief types, I\'m not the most experienced RPG\'er so if my ideas are lame just ignore me.

There is more to being a thief than stealing from players. Thieves could have to oportunity to steal from NPC\'s/merchants with the chance of getting caught or jailed, and non thief skill characters would not have these options in thier menu or whatever we use. If you think of other illegeal type activities in RL there is loan sharking, gambling, and lots of stuff the could be \'criminal\' and consensual in game play. You don\'t have to take a loan from the mob, or gamble in a casino. Maybe even have raids on these places by the town gard adding some excitement by possibly getting caught in there. Could be good RP stuff to bail your buddy out who has a big gambling debt, or something like that. Could have sections of some towns that are designated \'Thieves Alley\' and give a little warning screen to alert people before they enter so they know they may get pickpocketed. That would probally be alot of work on the programing side though.

[Ikarsik]

lol PKing rules. Speaking of Everquest even on the non PVP server you could have free PVP.

The player starts off with a book. If player hands this in to a priest of discord player becomes a PKer and is allowed to kill other PKers but not non PKers. the name is also in red or something. to not be a PKer he has to not attack a player for a week or something then go back to the priest

also picking on the weak is fun. Its their own fault if they get in the way lol. Anyway you never really did loot weak players corpses. You just walk through a group of noobs and smash them all with a BAM and a ZAP and a AAAHHHH and walk away from a few piled corpses looking innocent.

with thiveing i guess you could only thieve from NPCs lol.

also speaking of PKing.....

[derwoodly]

Dalec,

I look forward to Paxx\'s posts, he is the only developer that thinks pking can be fun.  The rest of them are going for a EQ blue server feel.  One look at the number of posts on the different forums will tell you that pkers are  in the minority.

If Paxx ignores the forum, then we will be talking to ourselves.  Heck, if I read between the lines in Paxx\'s last post, I believe that that last post of Paxx\'s was his last post on this forum.

The crux of the problem is this, the top ten percent of PS players will be winning 95% of the battles.  This means as a newbe, or a non-power gamer, you will get killed 19 out of 20 times.  It does not take a rocket surgeon to figure out that after a few months the only ones on your server will be power players and idiots like me.  You have to have a very thick skull and a low forhead to play a game you loose all the time.

[Ikarsik]

lol

ok thinking realistic

they say they not plan for free pvp.

so lol that means they no plan for pvp.

but i do want to see things like guild wars were it is free for all between the two guilds. that would be funny. Walking into a room filled with people from the opposing guild. Next thing you know you are walking away a little bit richer while all the corpses in the room smoulder.

if only fragnetic could spare one server for pure PKing lol.

If only the devs would change their minds

[Ionas]

What i put down here is a combination of the ideas mentioned before on this forum.
However it\'s an impression of my thought on how PvP could be implemented without too much grieve.

Without PvP in general there should be at least NPC\'s to play the role of bandits/thieves/bountyhunters and the like. This way some aspects of fantasy worlds like a  escorted merchant still remain in PS. I really like the idea someone had of being able to play a NPC. Especially if you can pick a category like bandit/merchant/monster etc. This way NPCs can behave more intelligent creating more fun.

But i would want PvP to have almost no limit. Not because i like to attack other players, my char just defends himselfs and attacks only if it is really necessary.
To prevent random killing, killing a char doesn\'t give you any equipment or money. At death a char keeps all the stuff on his/her body. Nor do you gain experience of it. Also PvP might be only possible at a certain level.

Guards prevent slaughter/thievery in town, breaking the law means getting killed or paying a fine.
The only place for fights in town is in the arena (official competitions with tickets for seats would be fun) after a challenge by some law.
Stealing doesn\'t have to imply killing, a skill for pickpocketing is possible. Succes means a small amount of money is stolen, failure: the one who is stolen notices you or the guards try to arrest the thief. And carts of merchants are open for thievery.

Notorious criminals and members of a thieve guild are known to guards (are extra aware when this person is around), could have a bounty on their head and be outlawed. For the greatest criminals a public announcement is placed with ranking on a public location. Jail is however only for NPCs for obvious reasons it would be less fun to be captive.

Grieve causers can be found by letting a moderator know when a person kills x persons with obvious lower levels in a short while. Without good reason a penalty is inflicted based on the history of the characters conduct.

Besides private property there is guild property. This is dropped when your killed.

Just my notion of how i would make the game.

[derwoodly]

Originally posted by Ionas

Grieve causers can be found by letting a moderator know when a person kills x persons with obvious lower levels in a short while. Without good reason a penalty is inflicted based on the history of the characters conduct.

I believe this is exactly what the developers do not want.  They do not want to babysit all of the players.  If killing newbies is wrong, then the computer should not let you do it.  

The goal is a \"Non-grief\" game with PvP content so entertaining that even the hard core IRC chat type players will want to play.

Ionas did mention a system that you would loose nothing when you died.  This mightbe good place to start.  It really takes the sting out of death if you just respawn will all your stuff and gold.  It is not my favorite idea, but it is a good compromise.

I like the play a NPC idea too, mostly because it was mine.  I am going to call it the \"MOB for a day PK\" idea.  I think I have a leveling idea for it as well.  The first time you log on you will have to play a rank one type mob.    As you gain skill you can log on as bigger and bigger NPC\'s(MOB\'s).   It should work something like the way you \"unlock\" different Avatars in the playstation games.

Some key elements would be limiting the chat channel to prevent you from \"spaming the zone\" as an anonomous NPC.  You could have a private chat channel for chatting to other MOB type players like your self, but not to the regular players.  Your range as a MOB would also be limited.   You could not log on and travel too far from your spawn point.  If PS has zones then you would be limited to just that zone.  The general idea is for online players to replace the AI of the \"environment\" type mobs.

Thief type mobs!  They could have a deposit point.  A Thieves den if you will.  You run out of the den and rob someone then  return with the gold.  Smart players would know to stay well away of the Thieves den!  This in not just a player thing. The computer would do the same thing.  No more bandit camps that just stand there waiting for you to Mug and roll them! If you want your stuff back your just going to have to take down the Thieves den.  I am thinking this should be like a instance type dungeon in EQ.

What do you think?

[Ionas]

First of all let me apologize for making it look like it was my idea of playing an NPC. I tried to make clear it wasn\'t however after reading back my post i can see it isn\'t obvious. It is a great idea however.

The problem with not losing stuff at death is of course it makes powerleveling easier. A possible solution to this is only keeping all stuff when slain by another player and losing some when killed during a battle with a NPC.

About my other idea: The devs don\'t have to babysit themselves, as on this forum other experienced players can do the job.
Or the system can be build in such a way that a player can only attack a number of players in a player in a period. Except when at war with those characters (after both agree with the challenge).
A third possibilitie is (as i posted earlier) when a character kills a number of players, a bounty is placed on that char. This bounty is then placed on public boards in the towns for all to see. Players playing bountyhunters can hunt these chars for money.
The person with a bounty has to pay a severe penalty to remove the threat.

[derwoodly]

Ionas,

First off let me say it is good to have one more pro pvp player.

Second, I did not think you were taking credit for the Mob-for-a-day idea.  You just said someone posted it.  I only mentioned it for humors sake.  The sarcasim in my voice does not always carry into my writing.  Most of my posts come off as much more angry than I actually am.

And Thirdly let me say the bounty hunter thing has been beaten to death, well actually all of the issues have been beaten to death, but they just keep respawning.  The problem with the bounty hunter idea is that it does not stop the PKer from griefing.  Sure they now have a tag on their head, but most serious pkers actually want a bad rep.  So the roleplayers will leave the game and you will just have the old Pker vs Anti-pker game.  In addition the players who hunt the \"bad guys\"  would get tagged as bad guys themselves if they happen to kill a pker that just did not have a tag on his head that day.

The goal is to make the game as griefless as a carebear server.  I am not sure I will enjoy this type of game, but if I understand Paxx correctly that is the goal.

[Ionas]

Originally posted by derwoodly
Second, I did not think you were taking credit for the Mob-for-a-day idea.  You just said someone posted it.  I only mentioned it for humors sake.  The sarcasim in my voice does not always carry into my writing.  Most of my posts come off as much more angry than I actually am.

I know, its just that after reading my post back it looked to much like i was claiming the idea as my own. I am glad you see it that way

About the bountyhunter notion. Though it has been brought up countless time and every argument has been said about the idea i can\'t help myself posting about it. If we keep nagging perhaps the devs come around *wishfull thinking*. I really like the idea of bountyhunters.
Maybe in the future an experiment with such a system can be carried out to find out how it works out. For now it is better to have a simple game without pvp. In the future this can be extended with advanced pvp.

[derwoodly]

Bounty hunter system...

OK, for arguements sake lets sapose we have a bounty hunter sytem.  It works something like this.  You are angry at some player for some reason and you kill them outside of town.  You now are tagged as a killer.  As a \"killer\" you will now have to watch your back because there is a bounty on your head.  The player you have killed has reported you some how and your name is on a list as a bad guy.  Two possibilities can be the case.  One, your evil and getting a price on your head is a badge of honor and you embark on a mission to see how high the bounty will go.   Two, it was a moment of weakness and your really sorry, but now there is no turning back, your involved in a soap opera style adventure.

Maybe this is what you want. But, in neither case has PKing been reduced.  I believe that a bounty huntersytem while fun, would do nothing to discourage Pking.  In fact I think it would encourage it.  It turns the MMORPG into cops and robbers.

It is also not needed.  If you have a full PvP system the players can easily form there own police system.  You will get killers and bounty hunters without any kind of special tag.

[Ionas]

Okay i see your point. Ill just discuss them one by one.

You say that there is no turning back, this isn\'t the case though. You can always pay a fine and be free. I admit some strong players could try to have a higher bounty and so the effect would be the opposite of the supposed one. Don\'t know a way to counter this right now, if i come up with any ill post it.

And yes a cop/thug system can and will be created by players. However in my post i stated that the system supports the bountyhunters. A bountyhunter gets money when the person is slain. Public notices are available. And the bounty is automaticaly attached.

[derwoodly]

Ionas,

I can see you like the bounty hunter idea.  If it worked like you said it would then I would like it too.  I just can not imagine how.  

For the sake of arguement, I am going to assume the role of griefer in PS.  First thing I need to do is make a griefing character and level him to a point where he can kill with ease.  I will be very nice and make lots of friends untill I get to a point where most of my skills are maxed out.  I will want skills that help me against other players.  I will need stealthing skills and high damage and a way to stun my victoms.  Wizzard stlye characters are usually good for this.  

When I log on I will look for lowbie players and ones that are injured.  Cast invisibility, sneak up on victom, stun-nuke-loot dead corpse.  Then log off.  Eat a casual lunch, mow the lawn, log back on and kill more victoms. Log off, watch TV, Hug and kiss the wife, log back on and kill more newbies.

With this style of play most of the bountyhunters wil get frustrated because I will not be online long enough to let them find me.  I will have a good time and get a huge ego bost at haveing large numbers of kills to my name.  I could even fire up the ol\' modem, open a Earthlink dial-up account and lead a double life.  I could even hunt myself down!  Oooohh I will get that dasterly Evil wizzard!  what a low life killing helpless newbies!