Here's another point I hesitate to bring up, because, while it's important and I think is almost entirely overlooked, it's easy to mistake for the whole point instead of just a factor.

In the current conflict, all nations are always involved, all the time.

We used to have a running joke about Celenwilde vs. Magnadoring, but at its worst, those alliances (or any of their other combinations) had an erratic rhythm. They would shift, there would be interruptions, even on a day-to-day basis where they'd be set aside because of a domoth fight or an event or anything else that came up. People complained about how all-pervasive they were at a time when they weren't really that pervasive at all.

But now, the current alliances are truly, entirely, all-pervasive. There is never a time when the politics shifts, except maybe the duration of a village influence (and even then these alliances mostly hold). There's never a jolt to the momentum to break it up or slow it down.

I seriously don't see how anyone can be forced to defend during raids in any other way than how you're 'forced' to do your guild tasks to be promoted or 'forced' to be able to do quests to play a role in events or 'forced' to be able to roleplay at a certain level not to be frowned upon in certain interactions. You can choose to put effort into those things or not, if you don't care about the benefits; the worst consequence is that you get disfavoured, which you can then make up for by excelling in other areas. Don't let yourself be bullied into defending by those who would demand it, a non-combatant rarely makes a difference, anyway, and this is an IC fact that you can pair with the fact that you're more useful for the commune/city in other ways (if you really feel you have to defend your non-participation in combat).

As for the second point, do you really get attacked by people everywhere you go? If so, then that has probably more to do with your promiment position in experience ranking than anything else (which would still suck). I don't have the impression that people are being ganked all the time or frequently, even off Prime; it doesn't appear to be a common problem, and nothing really that has people shiver and sit on their home turf all the time.

To be fair, the same can be said of Celenwilde and Magnadoring, heh.

I think all it takes for things to break and shift is just another event/the respective Divine nudging it.

See hai'Gloh/XI. I'm still a big proponent getting rid of them altogether. Get rid of them, and we'll have no serious mechanical reason to stick with Mag. Not that I mind sticking with Mag.

When don't you?

I absolutely agree with Celina's points, and I think progressive defenses along with insanity effects would be a good quick-fix direction to go.

I mind sticking with Celest. I was told I needed a crazed druidess to keep my Harley avatar. Where am I going to get one of those now!?

My preference would be to create an event that would end it, with some kind of actual conclusion or resolution. But while Lusternia has dropped things, it virtually never does it because players suggested it, so I'll set it aside. Assuming Lusternia will never decide this was a mistake:
1. Cut the rewards for it down a lot.
2. Encourage those gods who are involved to find reasons (or create events that give them reasons) to be less gung-ho about it.
3. Make a few adjustments to the quests to make them be about principles, not denizens. (I can suggest specifics if you like, even outline specific event ideas, though every time you ask me for that level of detail about how to improve something, I pour hours into it and then nothing comes of it.)
4. Encourage the gods mentioned in #2 to promote those principles, and to explore the question of whether those principles are more important than others.
5. Make some events that reinforce the other principles we used to be about, and/or events that break the momentum of conflict by forcing us to do something else or change alliances temporarily. (See note on #3.)

I know you were hoping for things like "change how discretionary power A interacts with skill B". I can do some things there, but other people have already done good on that, and like I said I think the only issue I see there is the comparatively-minor one about Ladies/Daughters which you've already shot down. But I just don't think this is really that kind of problem. Tweaking mechanics will at best mitigate symptoms.

It's going to take more than a "quick fix" practical idea to balance things out. Band Aids won't do anything at this point. Celina, Xenthos, and Lendren all hit it pretty well in different spots.

Now obviously I don't play anymore, but I happened to be browsing these forums and I think I can offer a bit of input of some relevance. You can take it or you can leave it.

Q: How do you know that you're winning a war?
A: The enemy smobs are dead and your smobs are alive.

Virtually every facet of Lusternia encourages raiding. You do domoths to get buffs for raids. You raise vernals to have them in team combat and to have them conquer domoths for buffs for raids. And so on. It bewilders me that you'd build a game where every facet is oriented towards one thing, and then act confused when people don't stop doing it.

Let's not start throwing around the "band aid" canard--that shuts down discussions real quick. I don't think there needs a "massive overhaul" of anything. We're looking for practical suggestions to help smooth matters out. The hai'Gloh/Xion Initiative was brought about as a method where communes can band together and fight cities and vice versa (what people have been wanting for awhile). I'm fine with the mechanics of the quest and letting the city/commune leaders decide when they want to ally. Perhaps, however, a negative consequence of doing the quests may give the player orgs pause before enacting them. Ideas?

Perhaps a way not only to stop the quest, but reverse it. Example, if the communes do hai'gloh and the cities complete a quest to reverse it, the communes suffer a loss equal to what they would have gained.

edit: Would have to be more difficult than the quest to simple remove it, obviously.

I hope it doesn't seem like we act confused when people don't stop raiding. We don't deny raids are important! But when there's enough complaints, we consider looking at ways to help balance the systems so it's not overly burdensome.

FYI, I don't think there are any gods who are "gung-ho" about the quests at the moment. I think if you believe that, your information may be faulty.

Seriously... Stop with the "you don't have to defend" deal. Your only real choices, as an RP-er with decent levels and CR/GR, are:

1: Come defend, interrupting meeting with a protege/holding a guild ritual/etc, and probably die.
2: Don't defend, and get the combatant-leaders/high-ranking combatants angry at you (thus making you dislike the atmosphere of Lusternia).
3: QQ.

Now, which choice, for a noncom, is the least frustrating?

Also, I would support constructs for defense; Don't know how this'd work, exactly, but it'd certainly be awesome.

Also, remove Hai'gloh/XI- it's the only thing keeping the current alliances together, and quite frankly, they don't make terrible sense (Taint/Light... walking each other's streets? Huh?)

Well I can only think of one thing on the HI side. When it's in effect have it disturb the natural cycles in some way that would effect everyone. The only example I have at the moment is making herbalist not able to plant any thing. What's growing would reach it's cycle and that's it until it's over. I'm not certain how the world would be effected though with the cosmic planes being effected. Note: I am uncertain at this moment if the elemental planes are effected, if so then there's major rp possibilities not to do it.

I hope someone else can add to this.

Well, I was thinking something like the cosmic lords weaken and half the elemental creatures disappear for the Xion Initiative, or the nature avatars weaken and half the fae on faethorn disappear.

Ah. That does make logical sense, I was going towards something that would effect everyone. But of course something like that never stopped the cities in the past.

But those do sound like reasonable ways to negatively effect the HG/HI. But I see an annoyance with the fact that Avatars being raised again with the HI in effect. But then again we can just get essence from the ethereal creatures, and Xion I suppose.

How about the XI/hai'Gloh causing bits of the planes to blend together so you end up with Water/Celestial/Forest terrain/effects on Nil, etc? Nothing major, just small annoyances that give an RP reason for people to hesitate.

The raid two nights ago was, for quite a while, 8+ real, solid combatants killing Viynain. The greater pent antics regarding ladies/daughters are pretty grossly silly as well.

Something to note however, is how much orgs here work on a messiah system. Shuyin left Seren, seren has largely collapsed. Thoros went inactive for a bit, and nearly the only person defending Nil was Aliod. For like, weeks.. Thoros comes back, and suddenly some of the people who claim to really like combat come pouring out of their lairs. Both examples show what "raiding" really consists of here- one or two very strong combatants, and a mob of people who like being on the side of said really strong combatants when said strong combatants are beating the stuffing out of what ever org is being shoved through the garbage disposal.


And proceed to hop up and down on the weakest org they can find. Not regularly- that would imply there was a pattern to it- but from log in, to log out, then when you log back in, it is still going on.

And when the sitation ever changes? *poof*.

I think, if the people who really want combat truly do want conflict, Thoros's request for ways to create more 1v1 should be looked into- so long as it it is more of the voluntary sort of 1v1, and not "I can isolate a non/seminon-combatant and pound them to crap" sort of 1v1. Insanity in enemy territory would be nice to ensure people were on opposing planes for an actual reason as well, and not just setting up camp there.

And yes, defense is forced, if not explicitly, than largely implicitly through DFs and what not.

Something else that really kills the urge for underdogs to even walk into a fight-

Those abilities that, in a group especially, are immediately "whored" to death and back, and are utterly debilitating almost immediately in a group. If they were toned down, or altered so that there was enough immunity that targets had a more reasonable expectation of response, it wouldn't be as horrid.