IC, Magnagora is fine with defending, we get an attack every few IC weaks. OOC, it's a headache.

Idea:
Out in the mountains there are a number of "artifact" like items, all currently in existance. Examples include the following rooms:

Claw-like protrusions.
Lonely shrine.
Vestera's Eye.
Standing outside a weatherbeaten mausoleum.
A deep cave shining with harmonic beauty.

What if people could go to these locations, enter them and be transported to a small offplane area where they could enter some voluntary combat over a personal reward without Avechna getting mad.

For example, inside the mausoleum, there could be a number of restless ghosts all claiming to be the true owners of a fortune. Each person wanting to participate would agree to help one of the ghosts prove he is right in exchange for some of the money. Each ghost gives it's champion a key. The fighters then fight over the keys. Whoever ends up getting them all can give them to his ghost and get a good chunk of change.

Non-prime planes aren't protected by the Avenger nor are we planning to change that. Thus, non-prime planes are de facto 'free-pk' zones. If players mutually agree not to pk there, that's wonderful. However, this does not change the fact that Avenger won't be active there, nor can you issue successfully for being killed there (it'll just be dismissed). It is completely up to players on how to police those planes or administer justice if someone is killed there.

In practice the benefit would be pretty low for the occupier except in RP terms. You'd have to pay the guards there a heck of a lot more and the quality you could get would be pretty low. You couldn't really work or access their nexus so all power is being fueled by your nexus. You'd have to spend a lot of time keeping the denizens swayed in your favor as if the rebels get a couple swayed against you that could be some sort of multiplier effect where those denizens then spoke to other denizens and so on and so forth until the whole place was waiting to put a dagger in your back and even the guards started quitting their posts. Fun to think about anyway.

Yeah, this was my entire rationale for theorizing about such a state

I primarily view the game through the lens of what would be "cool" or what would further the storyline of Lusternia. Good thing I'm not in charge of designing new mechanics, really.

I think this is one cause of dissatisfaction. People think they'll be able to use the area for what it looks like it's for (influencing Fae for minor golds, xp and power) and then get jumped and die and don't even get suspect to prevent it happening over and over again.

If people expect stuff, and don't get it, they're disappointed, disgruntled and more likely to give up and go play something else.

If you're not willing to budge on it, I can understand that, but I don't think enough has been done to propagate the idea that people aren't supposed to be able to go there and expect not to get killed for it.

Quoted for emphasis. I especially like the first line.

I'm not sure why the communes aren't telling newbies that the Avenger doesn't protect the ethereal. It's been this way from day one!

Maybe somewhere in a college/commune scroll before they go there?

It's not -just- that people don't know the Avenger doesn't protect it. I guess it's a question of attitude. The area is presented to us as a low/midbie influencing area, but for a seemingly arbitrary reason if you get nailed there you can't do anything about it. Same for every single aetherbubble, none of which look remotely like they're supposed to be warzones or PK hunting grounds. It doesn't really connect.

EDIT: Rather, they don't look like player warzones, I know about the pastry war and cankermore etc. etc.

Hmm, maybe I wasn't clear. Could be, I'm sleep deprived . I certainly didn't mean to imply there should be admin enforced pk rules.

What I'm trying to say is, even though you've designated the non-prime planes as 'free-pk' zones, people still feel wronged if they're jumped. If I were to randomly jump Magnagorans (not unreasonable rp-wise) on astral, I'm confident some OOC complaining about me would start to surface on forums quite quickly. I'd probably get angry tells as well. I've had people swearing at me in tells for raiding earth for about 15 minutes to get essence, with only one other person with me. No matter how many times off-prime is called "free-pk," that doesn't make it a place for bored players to amuse themselves with combat, because it will just cause the losers to get fed up and leave, due to the previously mentioned feeling of being wronged if pk is initiated at a undesired time.

Edit: If I don't make sense, listen to Shiri, he seems to be thinking in a similar direction as me.

As I think on this, we *could* of course extend Avenger protection to ethereal, elemental and cosmic. Before you go ballistic and give knee jerk reactions, think it through. Avenger would protect those in their home plane. You could still jump enemies in your home planes. You could still attack the mobs on other planes and attack those who try to defend those mobs. Just thinking out loud.

The problem really boils down to the mentality of the player.

I think this would even further discourage conflict - the change really has to come from the minds of players, not from admins to artificially limit conflict. It will dissatisfy those seeking conflict and will make players who die even more upset when they do.

A lot of this could likely be solved by players accepting that the game is not always going to be exactly how they want it and if they are truly being "forced" to do things they do not want to do and find no enjoyment in at all, then they need to figure out why their gameplay is forcing that.

Regardless of Catarin's RP she doesn't do anything that I as a player don't really feel like doing. That village revolted and the last thing I want to do after a long day is run around influencing a bunch of mobs? Log off. An event is going on? Log off. Don't feel like defending? Log off. Can't say it has really hurt my character much as it's not like I announce on the city channel "I don't feel like this, good luck storming the castle boys!" But it's definitely a much more enjoyable playing experience when you only participate in the things you want to participate in.

Still, people taking responsibility for their own gaming experience or not, that doesn't really solve the underlying problem of the glass ceiling and the resulting player bed-death.

Anyways.
I think a major reason for the abundance forum whining is actually the Lack of Rants thread. Not that a thread wouldn't have eventually popped up, but..yeah.

DOWN WITH LACK OF RANTS! It's a cesspool of whining and bias!

Hrm, are you asking for Avenger for protection for aetherbubbles?

Maybe the issue is semantics 'player warzone' != 'free pk zone' -- i.e., even if areas aren't designed for player org conflict doesn't mean they are protected by the Avenger (and vice versa). Maybe think of them as 'frontier' zones rather than 'warzones'.

That would really not be fun. One of the things I dislike about Avenger is that if you kill all the defenders, they all have status on you, then they can pick off the attackers one by one, and the attackers have to choose between watching the targeted allies die one at a time, or getting vengeanced for helping.

Edit: Defend would fix that, but still... no avenger off prime

Yes, this is quite right. However there are factors in place contributing to that mentality, and thus people feel wronged when the system suddenly appears to betray them and yanks the avechna rug out from under their feet. It's like when you have really nasty "just in case" small print in contracts that no one expects you to enforce, and when you enforce it for whatever reason they get upset. If it was clear enough that people should go there expecting to die instead of participating in the midbie influencing zone like they would anywhere else, they'd be less unhappy about it.

@Estarra: I've always wondered why off-prime is seperated as arbitrarily as it is when there are still reasons for people who don't want to PK to go out there. I don't think making it all Avenger-protected is necessarily a good idea, but I do think there is something funny in that system that needs looking at.

EDIT: The existing avenger system has its own issues. Daedalion runs into prime Seren, gets hit, leaves, bleeds to death, gets suspect? WTF? That's not the only messed-up thing either.

That's actually a curious idea. Turn off the rant section of the forums. Actually turn off the forums altogether! For let's say a month or two. See what changes that brings about in game. The public board might actually get used! People might engage in verbal sparring somewhere other than the boards... People might start finding IC solutions to their problems instead of relying on OOC guilt trips.

I'm all for that. Would sure help my studying too.

I like the idea of removing lack of rants, actually - the effort people had to go to to start a new thread to bitch totally made a difference, I can tell you that. That's another issue though. I suggest bringing it up in a different topic.

EDIT: not the forums though, I need those to breathe