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.. and I'm not calling it PvP in the title, since roleplay doesn't stop the moment you hit that hostile button, though I'll slip back into the acronym later.
There's been some discontent about the state of things, some bits justified and some bits resulting from the high tension of battles where your character's reputation and possibly life are on the line. I'd like to discuss this in a constructive way, with suggestions of things that can be done differently and openness to everyone's point of view.
Here, from my perspective, are some of the current issues leading to discontent. Possible solutions discussed below.
1.) Below Level 20 = Speed Bump. If that. It is the current truth that to have much effect on opposing-faction roleplay at the moment, you have to play a high-level character. There are a handful of specific exceptions, generally depending on a specific no-save effect (like Bigby's Forceful Hand) or faction gear (like the Legion ring of ... uh, Bigby's Forceful Hand). Any character fielded below level 10 will die in a single round to any combat-ready level 20 character. Any level 15 except for a fully-buffed caster will struggle to hit the level 20 due to attack bonus and saving throw advantages. It's only around level 16-18 that characters start being able to hold their own in terms of mechanics.
Naturally, in skill challenges and combat-by-post, level doesn't matter as much.
2.) All Downside, No Upside. Losing in PvP can be a pretty serious thing. You lose a big chunk of vitality, you could lose an item or all your carried gold (including possibly a lynchpin item like your weapon that makes you capable of surviving PvE environments in which you can get back your losses).
What do you get if you win? Well ... you -could- take gold or an item, at the cost of making the opposing player really mad. And ... well ... yeah, that's it. This bonus isn't specifically better for picking on characters your own size-- err, level. Granted, there are story and pride benefits, but in purely mechanical terms every PvP encounter makes the players as a whole poorer in the same way that every PvE encounter makes the players as a whole richer.
3.) Incentives Run towards Avoiding Contact. The combination of 1 and 2 provide an additional consequence I've noted: players tend to avoid, rather than seek, opposing-faction contact. This one is tricky; from an in-character perspective, this is fine and good. However, from an out-of-character perspective it leads to the server fragmenting into pieces that don't interact with each other. A playerbase of 40 can handle this; a playerbase of 5 or 10 can't, and usually ends with characters that have no interaction logging off.
I'm -very- guilty of this, often preferring to run through hostile areas with scry turned off to avoid any hostile people popping up fully buffed after I've been punching orcs / lizards / duregar for half an hour. Isn't an RP server about interactions, though? Shouldn't I want to encounter other people, even potential adversaries, even at the cost of XP and gold, to create exciting RP circumstances?
So! True to my word, some suggestions! Whee~
1. Create a way to retire characters for XP. Maybe even with a bonus for a PvP death. This, I think, would solve a -big- problem. A level 20 characters is hours and hours of time investment that would have to all be repeated for a new character. Lesser but still leveled characters have the same issue. Just as a ballpark, say you restart with 40% of XP or gold normally, or 45% if the character retired just died from PvP.
This accomplishes:
- Turnover among established characters. If people feel their concepts are getting stale and want to try something new, they get to do so without having to start from scratch.
- A sense of real danger. Now, people are dying when the vampire champions strike them down instead of popping up for another go. Death is real without being an imposed burden on players that would rather continue their characters.
- A benefit to PvPing, even if the PvP ended in you getting your ass kicked in. Is it so extreme to say that these encounters benefit the health of the server, if they lead to good storytelling and atmosphere, and should be rewarded? Even if the reward is only a little boost to starting over, if you feel it's time.
Other possibilities:
2. Faction Rep / Gold for defeat a same-level or above character. Possibly a 1/day script, to prevent abuse or mass gain from mass slaughter.
3. Default to subdual. Longer subdual knockdown period. I think one of the big reasons that subdual isn't used is that you default to lethal, and that even punching on them until they shown 'knocked out' doesn't keep them down long. This is especially true for characters with regen, which pop up almost instantly. A subdued character isn't locked out of roleplay, even if they're unconscious -- they get to see what's going on, even if they don't recall it, instead of just staring at the fugue. Likewise, lengthening the subdual period means that subduing a character isn't as likely to end in them just jumping back up and rejoining the fight, so it isn't as effin' stupid.
There's been some discontent about the state of things, some bits justified and some bits resulting from the high tension of battles where your character's reputation and possibly life are on the line. I'd like to discuss this in a constructive way, with suggestions of things that can be done differently and openness to everyone's point of view.
Here, from my perspective, are some of the current issues leading to discontent. Possible solutions discussed below.
1.) Below Level 20 = Speed Bump. If that. It is the current truth that to have much effect on opposing-faction roleplay at the moment, you have to play a high-level character. There are a handful of specific exceptions, generally depending on a specific no-save effect (like Bigby's Forceful Hand) or faction gear (like the Legion ring of ... uh, Bigby's Forceful Hand). Any character fielded below level 10 will die in a single round to any combat-ready level 20 character. Any level 15 except for a fully-buffed caster will struggle to hit the level 20 due to attack bonus and saving throw advantages. It's only around level 16-18 that characters start being able to hold their own in terms of mechanics.
Naturally, in skill challenges and combat-by-post, level doesn't matter as much.
2.) All Downside, No Upside. Losing in PvP can be a pretty serious thing. You lose a big chunk of vitality, you could lose an item or all your carried gold (including possibly a lynchpin item like your weapon that makes you capable of surviving PvE environments in which you can get back your losses).
What do you get if you win? Well ... you -could- take gold or an item, at the cost of making the opposing player really mad. And ... well ... yeah, that's it. This bonus isn't specifically better for picking on characters your own size-- err, level. Granted, there are story and pride benefits, but in purely mechanical terms every PvP encounter makes the players as a whole poorer in the same way that every PvE encounter makes the players as a whole richer.
3.) Incentives Run towards Avoiding Contact. The combination of 1 and 2 provide an additional consequence I've noted: players tend to avoid, rather than seek, opposing-faction contact. This one is tricky; from an in-character perspective, this is fine and good. However, from an out-of-character perspective it leads to the server fragmenting into pieces that don't interact with each other. A playerbase of 40 can handle this; a playerbase of 5 or 10 can't, and usually ends with characters that have no interaction logging off.
I'm -very- guilty of this, often preferring to run through hostile areas with scry turned off to avoid any hostile people popping up fully buffed after I've been punching orcs / lizards / duregar for half an hour. Isn't an RP server about interactions, though? Shouldn't I want to encounter other people, even potential adversaries, even at the cost of XP and gold, to create exciting RP circumstances?
So! True to my word, some suggestions! Whee~
1. Create a way to retire characters for XP. Maybe even with a bonus for a PvP death. This, I think, would solve a -big- problem. A level 20 characters is hours and hours of time investment that would have to all be repeated for a new character. Lesser but still leveled characters have the same issue. Just as a ballpark, say you restart with 40% of XP or gold normally, or 45% if the character retired just died from PvP.
This accomplishes:
- Turnover among established characters. If people feel their concepts are getting stale and want to try something new, they get to do so without having to start from scratch.
- A sense of real danger. Now, people are dying when the vampire champions strike them down instead of popping up for another go. Death is real without being an imposed burden on players that would rather continue their characters.
- A benefit to PvPing, even if the PvP ended in you getting your ass kicked in. Is it so extreme to say that these encounters benefit the health of the server, if they lead to good storytelling and atmosphere, and should be rewarded? Even if the reward is only a little boost to starting over, if you feel it's time.
Other possibilities:
2. Faction Rep / Gold for defeat a same-level or above character. Possibly a 1/day script, to prevent abuse or mass gain from mass slaughter.
3. Default to subdual. Longer subdual knockdown period. I think one of the big reasons that subdual isn't used is that you default to lethal, and that even punching on them until they shown 'knocked out' doesn't keep them down long. This is especially true for characters with regen, which pop up almost instantly. A subdued character isn't locked out of roleplay, even if they're unconscious -- they get to see what's going on, even if they don't recall it, instead of just staring at the fugue. Likewise, lengthening the subdual period means that subduing a character isn't as likely to end in them just jumping back up and rejoining the fight, so it isn't as effin' stupid.
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