This was an idea inspired from a discussion on these forums (I forget which one it was). It is an idea the administration has discussed amongst ourselves but have tabled. Again, the reason I am bringing it up here rather than just implementing it is to get your feedback on a system that could greatly impact Lusternia. The idea is to provide something of a way for players who don’t care for PK combat to seek retribution beyond the Avenger system for getting killed. We also hope it would curb excessive PK on the prime. This is how it would work:

Karma is gained in two manners: (1) everyone gains one karma point a game month; (2) any quest that awards experience would also award a small amount of karma. Karma can never go above 100 and never fall below 0. If you kill someone on the prime, you’d suffer a karma loss. You’d also be placed on your victim’s suspect list.

If you have someone on your suspect list, you have 7 game months to curse that person (in other words, you can’t “save up” the ability to curse that person but rather have to use it). This costs karma and it would also remove that person from your suspect list. (If you don’t have enough karma at the time you get suspect, you’d of course have the 7 game months to quest until you acquire enough.) If you get cursed, you can remove the curse but this also costs karma.

(I won’t go into what the curses are or how they’d come to exist as we’d want to leave something as a surprise if we go with it. Suffice to say, if you are cursed, you’d want to remove it as the curse would increase in power the longer it’s upon you.)

For the sake of an example, lets say that cursing someone costs 50 karma points (so not easy to curse multiple people in a row). Removing a curse costs 100 karma points minus 5 karma points for each hour online you've been cursed (to a minimum cost of 10 karma). So if someone is cursed, they could immediately remove the curse for 100 karma. Alternatively, they could suffer the curse for a few hours and reduce the karma cost (wait 10 hours and it will only cost 50 karma to remove the curse). People with low karma may think twice before playerkilling and those who do PK could potentially suffer many curses. Again, this allows an RP way for players to address getting PK’ed on the prime. If you PK a person on the prime infrequently, you’d probably never have to worry about curses as you’d have the karma to recover. If you do get someone on your suspect list, you have the choice of letting the Avenger protect you for a game year against that person or to curse that person in retaliation.

If we do decide to go with the karma system, we would not include the PrimeBond skill discussed earlier.

I see problems with groups of people co-ordinating curses. Would they stack?

It's hard to really judge without knowing what the curses are, because I can see a problem if curses are fairly strong as in screws the person over fairly bad. And like Ceres said, do different types stack? Provided there are different kinds.

besides soem current buggy aspects about suspects and things of that nature, which I'm sure can easily be fixed as time goes on, I think its a good compromise.

It gives incentives without being a Black or white situation.

I'd put the curse removal at a fair bit lower, because otherwise death would just be a 1-for-1 trade, ehh. Which isn't really good.

If I had to chose between prime bond and karma, I would go with karma. Though I don't really like either and still think the problem is summoning and to a lesser degree teleportation.

I would hope that you would lose less karma for killing someone who themselves has less karma. I don't really try to kill random people but just fighters and in village battles, so I don't think it would be fair for me to get cursed just because I'm winning

There would be different types of curses and you couldn't get 2 curses of the same type (so there'd be a limit to how many curses you have).

The curses would start mild and slowly build so you could definitely work for karma to get the curse removed and not be severely impacted. The first hour you may hardly notice the curse.

Aye, I think the amount of karma you lose when you kill someone should be based on the amount of karma the person you killed has.

You shouldn't get suspect status, or loss of karma when you kill people in enemy territory, as thats the way the current rules work.

Additionally, I see situations like expendable newbies/creditless characters/alts attacking people knowing they'll die because their deaths are irrelevant yet they can still mess up their target if they kill them. It seems easily abuseable from the current description.

Nah, I don't like this. If, as often happens, Daevos and co were to raid Delport while there were no Celestian fighters but me on, I'd go, get one, be cursed, remove the curse, get one, be cursed, be screwed until I grind grind grind quests enough to remove the curse.

Edit: Before you jump on the enemy territory part, the fighting often happens on the highways etc.

Hmm, I don't like this idea... I think it would be TO much in componation with avenger...

I don't think the solution exsesive PK on the prime is to add more punishment, it is to add inspiration to have it happen on the other planes. Perhaps planar villages, make Earth and Water planes more tied to the cities?

I think we need to focus PK to the outer planes instead of creating more punishments on the prime.

you would not get cursed if they raided delport, because in delport(it being owned by celest) you don't get suspect from killing people. (therefore not being able to get cursed)

I don't like this at all. It's bad enough that the Avenger stops people from killing someone twice in a row, but now you have it as:

Daevos kills Ceres
Daevos doesn't kill Ceres again, but since Ceres has suspect on Daevos she curses him.

Why not just upgrade the Avenger somehow?

person A kills person B

person A has x karma
person B has y karma

Person A loses (y-x)/5 karma for killing someone with higher karma (50 killing 100 would lose 10 karma points) and loses (x-y)/10 for killing someone with lower karma (person with 100 killing person with 50 loses 5 karma points)

Just a random idea. Perhaps use more complicated measures.

Ceres would probably not be able to curse Daevos, as Ceres will have 0 karma, and won't have the 50 or 75 karma available to curse Daevos

Perhaps a max karma vs. playing time? Every in game day, you add a 10% max to your karma? (100, 110, 120, etc.)? ::shrugs:: an idea.

This isn't a solution really to players who like to PK on the prime in non-enemy territories. They like to do it. They get a rush from it. No matter what you do to encourage killing on other planes, some people will still hunt on the prime even if its only for the grief it causes. We are looking for solutions that don't require subjective determinations on whether the kill was RP-worthy.

Anyway, regarding other planes, yes, we are working on just that, but keep in mind it it will take a long time before we can build any meaningful systems on other planes. (I don't think many of you realize how hard and long it takes to build, say, one medium sized area with quests, etc.)

Well at least make it so they need to pick between calling avenger or cursing... Or let people use Karma to buy there way off Suspect lists? That way if you don't PK much, you will be able to get off a suspect list no problem, if you PK frequently then you wont?

the only people I see complaining so far are the ones who PK a lot.... sounds good to me!