Hi Everyone,
I have been reading serveral threads here and a lot of them have good ideas. I would like to add one of my own. Now some of it comes from other threads so there is no need to say you already thought of it.
Personally I don't think having a PvP/PK/Thieving system without a players consent is a good idea. It will most likely allow for ways to be abused. Even if complex counter measures are put in place. Therefore I think players should have a choice in the matter. I would instead like to offer the following suggestion. Always allow PvP/PK/Thieving in guild wars, groups and between buddy's. If you don't want this you can leave a guild/group or dismiss a budy. Note that for the buddy system anyone you make a buddy is allowed to PvP/PK/Thieve you not the otherway around. For guilds I would suggest this can be either turned on or off. It might even be a nice feature if a picking order feature. When turned on any guild member who kills or wins a challange from higher guild member will gets his/her rank. The higher guild member would get demoted to a lower rank. If the guild member looses he has to pay a price which might be fixable in the guild settings window.
For other RP goals I would suggest to have like public groups (should have a better name). Anyone within a group is allowed to PvP/PK/Thieve eachother without consent. These groups would be persistent and anyone can join one or more of them without consent. An in-game window may list all available and mention the RP purpose of the these groups. Making use of character descriptions could aid in this form of RP-ing. Off course some players should be assigned master and be able to kick players out who are not keeping to the RP purpose. Players should be able to create these groups. The one to create it is master. Any master can make other players master. Masters can edit the RP goal of the group. If no player is left it is disbanded. Maybe these groups could be listed in the events window.
My thoughts on regions. Many threads suggest that certain regions should allow PvP/PK/Thieving. Personally I wouldn't vote for that. Since levels within PS differ a lot, one would never know how dangerous a region is. If a power leveler is lurking around he/she would be able to kill most. There wouldn't be much a player could do about that. However I can imagine that NPC's would make certain area's dangerous, like it is now. But instead of just killing you, they may also decide to steal from you. If you wish to get it back you have to loot the NPC. Also NPC would run away if they can't win the fight or call upon other NPC's to aid them. Another nice feature would be that charisma matters in these regions. Having a high charisma will make NPC's hestitate to attack you. I think this would allow for dangerous region's with a fixed danger level. Off course NPC must be aggresive in these area's. Also factions may come into play. If you have a high faction level with for instance trepors they don't attack you. Though I don't know how one may accomplish this.
Some thoughts on thieving.
I don't know if the developers have thought about how to implement this yet. However I would like to offer the following idea.
Currently we have everything in our inventory and the simplest way to implement thieving would be to allow a random loot at a lower level and a choice at a higher level. Another way that might be interesting is to replace the inventory with sacks. A player could then have a belt which can hold a number of sacks. There could be different kind of sacks. For instance a money sack, a weapons sack, glyph sack we have already, one for general items, one for books, ... . A player could have any amount and any combinations of these sacks limited to how many fit on a belt. A player with the pick pocket skill would only be able to steal a sack without knowing what is in it. At a lower skill level the player steals a random sack, at a higher skill level a player can choose between sacks, at even a higher level he/she may be able to identify the type of sack. Now there may be different belts, one may be able to hold more sacks than others. Also a belt may be able to contain a few items (glyphs) of it's own which can't be stolen. Also a belt may be warded by magic. Requiring a thieve to have a certain level of anti-magic to be able to steal or suffer the consequences. Also other types of clothing may be able to hold some items that can't be stolen, like for instance bracers. This would allow for a rich way to store your items and would make thieving a bit more difficult. Also this would allow certain special items to not get stolen. Glyphs for instance are very important to a mage. The small inventory window could still show everything you have to make trading and such easier.
Now these are just some thoughts you may disagree, but please mention reasons.
