This is not a good solution as it can be pretty common where a challenger is attacked or dies and needs to reform in some shape or form that requires a lot more than 5 minutes. An ascendant reforming takes 15 minutes in of itself, not counting time needed to raise defs again.

I disagree with this assessment. First, you ignore the fact that five minutes is merely a suggestion. It's a variable that could be readily manipulated. Second, I don't believe reform time should be considered when challenging a domoth. If you are so tight for essence that you can't bother to phoenix, and there is reasonable enough resistance around, you may very likely be made useless during stage 2. If an ascendant makes a challenge while underprepared, then they will suffer the consequences. Nevermind that you could still potentially take control back during stage 2 if you lost it during stage 1.

Have you participated in a domoth battle during stage 1 to see what they are like? Being able to interrupt someone by preventing them from standing before the throne for a short period of time just discourages conflict altogether as people will be inclined to just challenge when no one is around at all, moreso than it is now. This is the opposite of what it should be. There ought to be advantages to challenging when significant resistance exists. Why? Because it is honestly more fun for all parties involved to be able to fight a bit. Your suggestion causes the opposite to occur and is really a step in the wrong direction.

Yes. I've been through several, though admittedly that was all quite some time ago.

From my memory, stage 1 is typically very quiet and mostly a matter of mob management. Interference doesn't occur here because enemy organizations would rather wait to use an opportunity to take the domoth entirely as opposed to putting up a huge fight just to put it into dormancy. Or just to be a pain. They wait for stage 2 before getting serious.

I only saw any form of PK during one of those several trips through stage 1, and ironically, that was when there was only one member of one enemy faction (as opposed to many): Catarin. Her aim was to slow us down to give Celest as large a window as possible during stage 2 (and more time for certain people to log in), which she managed quite effectively at the cost of lots of essence.

Things may very well be different now. Maybe people actually fight during stage 1 without the objective being directly related to what can be done in stage 2. If opposing groups fight to actually put a domoth they aren't challenging into dormancy, then my idea is more faulty than I originally thought and I will accept that (especially given acknowledgment to skills like greatpent).

People can get away with challenging when no one is around at all partly due to forced dormancy being so very easy. As it is right now, you can prevent someone from standing before the throne during stage 1 if you really wish to, for a short period or otherwise. There's just no point in it unless you want to try to drive the throne into dormancy. And if you have the muscle power to do that, why not just go straight away for the domoth if you can?



This I will agree with. But really, when you look at my suggestion, all it's doing is trying to make stage 1 a bit more like stage 2. If it's a terrible, horrible idea, that would imply to me that something is also wrong with stage 2 as it is. Which is the only stage that has really strong incentive for the opposition to do anything. It's the only stage where the opposition can attain something positive (steal domoth = you get the goods) from engaging in combat as opposed to something negative (non-participation = enemy gets the goods) or neutral (domoth goes dormant = no one gets anything).

I will admit it's not a great fix, but I think the only way domoths are going to steer out of the direction of people challenging when there's no competition around is if there is a major rewrite of the system. I don't have that up my sleeve, so I made this suggestion instead. If you have a better one, bring it up!