MACRO: Alignment!

[Bane]

THE PROBLEM
 

• Alignment is too easily influenced.
• Killing one mob can swing your alignment up or down by a few hundred points at a time.
• With how easily influenced alignment is, it takes away from RP.(Just cause you killed someone evil doesnt mean your all of sudden should be going good.)
• It interferes with using spells and equipment throughout the game. And overall just becomes a nuisance than any type of game feature.
• Any GM can cast absolve to go good(Tier 1 spell), but only Espers can cast Evil Eye(Tier3 spell) to turn evil.
  
• Alignment also affects your mounts, buying a mount then going around and killing good alignment mobs will reduce your alignment to evil which in returns causes your mount to leave you. And considering the lack of mounts you can buy in game and white stallions are one of the best bought mounts that is good align no evil align mount matches its power. Once again just makes the current alignment a nuisance and not a thought out feature.

Ex. How easily Aligntment is Changed My Aligntment is at 1000
1ST KILL A cityguard in old yorke, it drops 125 points.
2ND KILL A brother in the Monastery drops 85 more points
10TH KILL My alignment is at 396.
27TH KILL I hit evil alignment -355

Most of these mobs I one hit, so it really takes no time for a person to run around and influence his Alignment to good or bad. Those 27 kills gave me a less than 20mil of experience and took me about 2 mins to run around and kill. Now just because of this system I spent all this money training a spell I can only use for 2 mins or hours upon hours doing a quest for 2 mins of being able to use it in this area. Makes the area a typical turn off towards the player.

THE GOAL
Creating a system where it takes more influence to adjust your aligntment up and down, But still allowing a quick fix to meet your alignment requirments(Evil Eye, Absolve, Temples).



Reaching the Goal(Ideas)

• A. Moving Absolve up to a tier 3 spell to match with Evil Eye.
  
• B. Adjusting the formula for alignment to allow for less of an impact when you kill a good or evil mob.
• C. Allow a time frame that keeps other mobs from affecting your alignment after your fist kill.

ex I can kill a Good aligned mob, it reduces my alignment by 50 but I can continue to kill Good Alignment mobs for the next 5 mins before it affects my alignment again.

• D. Bring in a religion system. Something easy and small to start out with 3 different religions one for evil, neutral, and good. If you join these religions it only allows your alignment to fluxate up and down to a certain point.

Evil Religion would only allow your alignment to go from -1000/-351
Good Religion would only allow 1000/351
Neutral Religion would only allow -350/350

   Religion system would be something we could expand on down the road, Maybe allowing -1000 evil alignment to give a bonus to damage or maybe the gods favor you and cast a fireball from hell towards opponent. If you are at 1000 the gods feel pity and can cast a heal on you. But we also need to allow moving back and fourth between a religion. You can start out as joining any one religion but if you leave one to join another you need to donate money; more times you switch the more money you will have to donate.

 This can overall bring in more RP to the game and make a player play his character how they see fit, also help bring in a gold sink.

[Once]

Love the format, very easy to read and understand. I have a pretty simple, yet important question for you:

Between 1 and 10, 10 being phenomenally important and 1 being an idle daydream how important do you think working on this is? Justify your number with concrete reasons. At the end of your reply look over your reasons and ask yourself if the number is correct. If not, change it.  


Look forward to seeing your response.

[Bane]

In the range of 1-10 Im going to give it a 7.

As I said before the alignment system is a nuisance not a feature. It's just an annoyance and keeps players from enjoying the game they want to play. Fixing this system can bring in new sets of skills/spells and can directly relate to fixing our combat.

 It limits character customization, and in a way FORCES RP on you. I want to be an evil class. I want to be able to use evil spells all the time because Im evil and thats the role I wish to play. Just because I decided that my just as evil friend Rahkz is stepping out of line and I kill him doesnt mean Im trying to be good alignment. Just means he pissed me off and I decided I was sick of being around him and his followers.

Ill bust out a subskill drainblood. As most people know subskills are not exactly the most easiest thing to find in game. But hey I found it. Ive gotten to uses it about none. I must be evil align to use this subskill. Now of course there is certain places in game I can use it all the time, but other places I go i can only use it for 10 mins or less. Why force the player to only be able to stay evil alignment in those places? It limits where a player can go and do stuff. It limits their imagination and can cause the player to not even bother.

We have absolve for priest and evil eye for esper. These are the only two classes with the ability to change their alignment. Which makes it alright to play as a GOOD priest or a EVIL esper, because you can just cast those spells to change your alignment every few mins. But thats annoying, I shouldnt have to cast absolve every 10 mins to stay good while Im killing a good align mob. Those goody two shoes could be someone that taken my sister away for a a sacrifice to god. Now I go slay 20 of them and im forced by the code to be evil? Im forced to play the game a way I dont want to play with in 10 mins of doing something in a certain area? Why cant I play as a evil priest and use my awesome spell demonshriek for more then 10 mins in half this world?

I can see over long period of times continually slaying good mobs you will be evil, but not with in 10 mins of being in an area. This is why it gradually needs to move.

Fixing the way we deal with alignment will also help improve and make our combat system more unique. This in a way is a micro of combat. Steps like these need to be fixed to fix the overall combat and could lead to interesting new features down the road, but also bringing new small improvements that everyone can gain from now and gain from even more later. It over all hinders game play experience from RP to Grinding.

This game is suppose to be about imagination, playing it the way you want to play. Lets not hinder someone and force them to play a different way 10 mins into an zone.

[Bane]

TASKS

• 1. Move Absolve to match Evil Eye
• 2.Edit help files to give more detail on where you can get your sins absolved or become evil
• 3. Change Alignment formula to make alignment gradually rise and fall
• 4. Add a script to Alingment mobs in Clan Halls to give 100 aligntment for good or -100 alignment for evil, regardless of the formula
• 5. Playtest new alignment changes
• 6. Make alignment changes go live
• 8. Create a background for three new religions one for; Evil, Neutral, and Good.
• 9. Discuss what benefits/penalties you get for joining a religion.
  
• 9. Create a code that only allows your alignment to fluxuate between certain values if you are part of a Religion
  Evil – 1000 to -350
  Neutral -349 to 349
  Good 450 to 1000
• 10. Add in a check to characters alignment to check if you are in a religion to not allow your alignment to go beyond the Religions values.
• 11. Code into worth a place to show your religion
• 12. Create a system to join a religion and to  keep track of how many times you have switched religions
• 13. Code in the new benifits penalties for being in a religion
• 14. Create a forumla that charges you for joining a religion dependent on how many times you have switched religions
• 15. Discuss if ethos will play a part of religion system
• 16. Script/Build the three religion systems.(Builders)
• 17. Create/Adjust helpfiles for new systems
• 18. Playtest religion system
• 19. Religion system live

if this looks good, move this up to my initial post.

[Bane]

TASKS NO 3
Ive tinkered with the alignment formula, and designed a system that will allow a character regardless of strength or level if they have 1000 alignment to continuous be able to kill good alignment mobs for an hour straight before they become evil.

Change the current alignment formula from:
GET_ALIGNMENT ( ch ) += ( -GET_ALIGNMENT ( victim ) - GET_ALIGNMENT ( ch ) ) / 14;
to
GET_ALIGNMENT ( ch ) += ( -GET_ALIGNMENT ( victim ) - GET_ALIGNMENT ( ch ) ) / 18;

Create a code that checks target mobs alignment on death, If you have killed a mob of that same alignment in the last 5 mins then no change to your alignment otherwise apply the alignment forumla.


With this system that way It will allow players to explorer a zone alot longer, but they still will have the quick fixes avaliable to them to change their aligment :Aboslve, Evil Eye, Temples to become evil or good, Clan Alignment Mobs.

Ive ran the calculations and this is what your alignment would look like if you started out with 1000 alignment and killed at least one good align mob every 5 mins. After an hour you would hit evil alignment.


(Starting Alignment)1000
888.88888888889
783.95061728395
684.84224965706
591.23990245389
502.8376856509
419.34670311474
340.49410849725
266.02221358074
195.68764615959
129.26055470628
66.523857222595
7.2725318213395
-48.687053279846
-101.53777254208
-151.45234073418
-198.59387736006
-243.11643972895
-285.16552641067
-324.87855272119
(Alignment after one hour)-362.38529979224



TASK NO 4:

My idea for payment of joining a new religion is they have to make a donation everytime they switch to join another religion. More times the switch the higher the payment is.

The forumla I thought could follow the same formula we use for convey maxmoves

turns (num of times used ) x 10 million
      (So if you use it 3 times it will cost you 30 million.)

[Jaros]

What's the point of all this?  Alignment is a ridiculous concept to begin with and does not deserve a 19 task list.  Just make it less fluctuating and put a mob in palpatine's bar that casts evil eye like the cardinal does absolve.

[Molly]

Adjusting alignment so that it doesn't change as quickly as now, sounds like a good idea. Also we could make a couple of more mobs cast evil eye, since two mobs that I know of cast absolve (the cardinals of Yorke and Fenizia), and only one to my knowledge casts evil eye, (Caine in Dun Shivaar). I wouldn't want it to be as simple as making Bart do it however, I am sure you can think of a better suited location.
It might even be worth while to make a couple of mobs in each of all dimensions cast absolve and evil eye respectively.

Implementing a full religious system is a much taller order, but I don't see why it couldn't work here, I know several other Muds have it, and at least some players enjoy it. And using our existing align system would obviously be the simplest way to implement it. And God knows we have enough Gods at least in Pre and Medieval to base some religions on.

For a religion system to work however, we need some kind of substantial reward to join a religion, or nobody will ever bother. And of course we'd need a matching penalty for leaving it, or people would just keep switching religion dependent on what zone they wanted to level in.

I'm not sure what the reward/penalty could be, perhaps a prayer to your gods in combats would produce an extra attack or heal. And a loss of exp points or TP or gold could be the penalty.

But there might be other and better options. If any of you have played a Mud where religions took a substantial part, some input about how they set it up would be helpful.

[Bane]

I actually was trying to figure out a place that would cast evil eye on me. I tried Hell and the priest where Rhakz is. I wouldnt of thought about Caine. And I think it would be a good idea to place mobs in all dimensions to cast those spells. Something like that might only take about 20 mins of work if we plan out who and where beforehand.

Something might wanna be discussed though about the Cardinal in Old Yorke though. Not only does he cast absolve on you you also get a letter of indulgence? Was that something intended?


As far as a religion system, im going to do some research and see how other people have used this. But something I was thinking, you get certain perks/penalties at various alignment ranges. So at -350 alignment you would get a very basic reward/penalty but at -1000 the reward is bigger and so is the penalty.

I dont think we should make penalties to steep for leaving though. But it really depends on how we do the system. If we make it so you can only fluctuate alignment in certain values, I dont want to see penalties to steep because of certain areas requiring you to be good to do the quest. Thats kinda why I liked doing the price for leaving like maxmove. Its cheap early on and progressively gets more expensive more times you switched. Maybe possibly tweaking it to make it more expensive. Could also add in a wait period. To keep people from just switching to go level in certain zones.

[Molly]

I think it would be easier if I come up with some suggestions for absolve/evil-eye mobs in the four dimensions myself, since I have a better overlook of the zones. I'll go through the files and post a suggestion of three mobs for each Dimension later. (I don't think we should have more than 2 per dimension and alignment, but it's best to have a reserve if any of them turn out to be unfit in any way (aggro, deep inside a quest zone etc.).

I would like some more input on the religions however. There could be other ways to handle those, for instance basing them on some existing Gods of the Realms.

And I am also not sure how to handle a Neutral religion. Evil and good are straightforward enough, but how would neutral work? Isn't it rather equal to no religion at all? And would we need a way to insta-set a player as neutral too?

[Molly]

OK, below is my suggestion for suitable evil-eye/absolve mobs.
We need two for each Dimension.

Feel free to come out with more suggestions, or test if any of those on my list are aggro, or too hard to get to.

EVIL EYE

PreHistoric
[ 7133] the priest                - [ 7172] The End Of The Road To Destruction  (Aegean Islannds)
[38435] the Anubis priest         - [38443] The Temple Of The Dead (Land of Kush)
[ 7631] Eurynomus                 - [ 7669] The Torments Of Tantalus  (Realms of Hades)

Medieval
[ 5003] the vampire priest of Mirkheim - [ 5006] Chapel Of Mirkheim (Castle of Mirkheim)
[18245] Caine                     - [18276] The Temple Of Caine (Dun-Shivaar)
[15070] Morgause                  - [15021] Staircase (Camelot)

Old West
[ 6810] Old Man Clanton           - [ 6841] Eagle Brewery Saloon (Tombstone)
[ 1142] Danny Boy                 - [ 1117] At A Waterhole In The Desert (Llano Estacado)
[ 1142] Danny Boy                 - [ 1117] At A Waterhole In The Desert (The Prairie)

Future
[ 5516] a River demon             - [ 5513] The Tunnel Of Blood (The Queltorian Sector)
[ 5511 a Demon spirit            - [ 5511] The Planet Of Malevolent Evil (The Queltorian Sector)
[17544] Jabba the Hutt            - [17544] Jabba's Throne (Starwars

ABSOLVE

PreHistoric
[44500] the Asclepios Priest      - [44451] The Sanctuary Of The Wounded (Aegean Islands
[ 7041] the statue                - [ 7046] The Temple Of Apollo
[ 5932] the Priestess             - [ 5978] The Sanctum Of Isis (Lower Egypt)

Medieval
[ 7529] the Cardinal              - [ 7558] The Secret Room Of Giovanni Donatello  (Fenizia)
[ 3051] the cardinal              - [ 3070] The Porch Of The Cathedral (Olde Yorke)
[15014] the priest                - [15035] Chapel (Camelot)

OldWest
[ 7723] Dr. Smith, general practioner - [ 7724] Dr. Smith's Office (Dry Gulch II)
[ 6867] Doctor Allen              - [ 6863] Doctor Allen's Surgery (Tombstone)
[ 6736] the Medicine Man          - [ 6752] The Tent Of The Apache Medicine Man (The Prairie)

Future
[17439] an ewok shaman            - [17434] The Ewok Shaman's Hut (Starwars)
[10427] Dr. Seuss                 - [38327] The Brain Drain Room (The Space Port)
[22822] Dr. Ernest                - [22832] On The 4th Tee (Future Golf Course)

[Loran]

[10427] Dr. Seuss                 - [38327] The Brain Drain Room (The Space Port)
i'd recommend changing this one, as its inside the Esper only class rooms

[Bane]

I had a thought Id like to express to see if anyone likes it.

Rather then have perks based on what your alignment is, make a ranking system within the religion. Higher rank you are higher benefit you get. On top of gaining a benefit you will also gain a penalty. Such as you might hit harder as your benefit but now its going to cost your more moves or stamina. If you leave the religion to join another you lose that rank and would have to start back over at the bottom if you ever rejoined.

I would say maybe make it work how dragonrealms II I think the zone is called works. Kill x amount of good or evil people and collect their souls to advance to the next rank. Maybe throw in one rank advancement where its not bringing in numbers but bringing in a harder soul to collect such a VOLTRON or ACHILLES. Make it some type of mind numbing experience a bit to kinda keep players from being able to swap back and fourth so easily.


As much as I would love to see religion factions in every dimension I dont think we have the playerbase to put it to full use. Kvetch has made a interesting thread a while back ago about religions which you can find here:
http://4dimensions.org/forum/index.php/topic,434.0.html

I was also thinking of who we would follow and I thought of 2 paths.

Pledging your allegiance to King Arthur and joining the Holy Crusade
Worshiping one of the Egyptians god for evil(Figure Molly would be the best to pick which one since she would know more about her own zone)


I also thought about it there really needs to be no need for a neutral religion. so scratch that.

If this is liked Ill draw up a rough draft on ranks/perks/and penalties.

What do you think about the Ranking system?
How many different deities should there be to follow?

[Calypso]

May I suggest the following incentives for the religions? The INNs can be added according to rank perhaps?

Good:  ability to cast cure critic or access to potent healing potion and INN BLESS, PROTECTION FROM EVIL
(worshiping deity's statue would cast 'absolve')

Bad: ability to cast 'harm (or whatever destruction spell that would be equal to cure critic) and INN PROTECTION FROM GOOD, HASTE
(Worshiping deity's statue would cast 'evil eye')

Neutral: ability to cast vitalize or fortify body, and INN SANC, SHIELD (or one of the various shields)
(worshiping deity's statue would cast '  ?  ' -[invisibility? a stronger shield? magic bubble? protect from good and evil?] )

[Bane]

May I suggest the following incentives for the religions? The INNs can be added according to rank perhaps?

I dont really like the idea on giving them INN's. Id rather see the spells have a randomn chance to be casted on them during battle. But it also my opinion. I kinda like the idea of maybe going somewhere and worshiping. Maybe add in a small chance that the spell stays INN on you till you log out if you worship?



My idea is having around 5 ranks in each religion.

Your ethos automatically goes opposite of what your in also.  (Evil Ethos set to Good/ Good Ethos set to Evil)
All spells are cast by the gods and only during battle (basically how the ring of sparkling raindrops work)

• 1. Some low level protection spells(bless,shield, armor)
  2. Higher protection spell or perk spell(Mirror shield, steelskin, haste, Mana shield)
  3. Increase damage done with ethos.
  4. Evil gets a small  healing spell / Good gets a small damage spell done to opponent
  5. Evil gets a big damage spell / Good gets a big healing spell.

Also I think we may need to discuss more on what to do about neutral. Im kinda up in the air either way with them. Maybe set neutral to taking 5% less damage from evil and good?


@Molly
Im halfway through your list of mobs for evil eye/ absolve, some of them are aggro at least by alignment. Ill get it to you soon.

[Jaros]

What are you trying to achieve here?

Are you after something else to do with your time?  Because this basically sounds like a few new quests with slightly different rewards.  Which would be great but why not concentrate on designing the quests rather than these vague global mechanics.

Or are you really hung up on getting more out of alignment?  If so, why?  Good-evil alignment seems to me like a shallow concept that should be gotten rid of, not built on.

Or do you just like the idea of joining a religion?  In which case, RP.

(Regarding the list of mobs for evil eye, the two in the Queltorian Sector are literally only a couple of steps from each other.  Seems redundant.)