NPC Town Guards

rainbird · Post by **rainbird** » Mon Jun 22, 2009 4:00 pm

I'm still a noobie here. Likely this idea has been raised and shot down previously, but from my limited experience in Illarion, here's my view.

In only a couple of game weeks (spread out over about 8-9 game months), I have personally witnessed, or heard of--from firsthand witnesses--no fewer than a half dozen robberies and/or murders within the city limits of Trolls Bane, most of them in broad daylight, and about half--as far as I can tell--got away scot-free. Literally every other day, some blood-thirsty cultist, brigand, mercenary or crazy mage is steam-rolling his way through town.

Trolls Bane is specifically presented to noobies as the place to start out, to get the feel for the world of Illarion. For myself, I was killed my second game day in Trolls Bane, in broad daylight. It has left a bad taste in my mouth, and if I were less addicted to RP-gaming, I would have quit that same day.

This is not the environment to introduce newcomers to ...

It seems as thought player-characters cannot handle the job of guarding the town. This is actually reasonable, since there are only 10-25 people playing at any one time, most often ... and most of those people want to be doing something other than just "walking a beat", which is clearly what needs to be done.

So, my recommendation is to have 4-6 NPC town guardsmen on patrol in/around Trolls Bane, 24/7. These guardsmen should be mid-level strength; strong enough that noobies could never defeat them even one-on-one, but weak enough that truly powerful characters could wipe out all of them together (not sure if game mechanics allow for such a range; I hope it does).

These guards should continue to be augmented by PO guards, exactly as PO guards are currently handled. Ideally, (and this would be up to the POs mainly), the NPC and PO guards should be indistinguishable at a casual glance, so the realism of not knowing who you're about to tangle with is maintained.

I have seen comments elsewhere, noting that there is an unspoken agreement, recognizing the existence of "background" NPCs doing normal things and living normal lives. In Trolls Bane at least, those NPCs should include guards.

Bellringer · Post by **Bellringer** » Mon Jun 22, 2009 5:23 pm

If the engine allows this, I'm all for it.

Joxia Doral · Post by **Joxia Doral** » Mon Jun 22, 2009 5:26 pm

I like this idea...BUT how they know who to respond to...and would it not be abused?

rainbird · Post by **rainbird** » Mon Jun 22, 2009 5:43 pm

I imagine the NPC guards would be programmed to intervene anytime anyone was fighting within the city limits. This would mean that "friendly" duels would have to occur outside the walls of Trolls Bane. I see that as an inconvenience, but not an unreasonable one.

Normally, NPC guards would wander randomly through the town. When someone shouts for the guard within hearing distance of a guard, he would immediately come to the person who shouted. When a guard is attacked, or witnesses an attack, he would immediately sound an alarm (probably a horn carried by all guards) that can be heard throughout the town, which will attract all the other guards.

On witnessing any fighting, an NPC guard would initially give all combatants a warning, to "Stand down immediately". Guards would then engage any and all combatants with weapons in hand, until such weapons are sheathed or dropped.

Under certain circumstances (character attacking/killing a guard, for instance), guards will forever after recognize certain characters as "wanted", and will always sound an alarm and attack such characters, on sight.

The trickier business of figuring out who was in the wrong, and whether property needs to be returned, would need to be handled by PO guards. Perhaps NPC guards could "take a report", by storing--verbatim--an explanation provided by people the guards are questioning, for PO guards to review at their convenience.

NPC guards would basically be a new "monster" type ... however, clearly, they would be a fairly complicated addition. I'm not sure what the system's capabilities and limitations are, or how difficult it would be to implement something like this.

For what it's worth, I am a programmer by trade. I have experience with C++, C# and Java, and I have had some limited exposure to Lua. Not sure how much time I could devote to it, but I would be interested in helping, if the game developers wanted it.

Joxia Doral · Post by **Joxia Doral** » Mon Jun 22, 2009 6:04 pm

Rainbird wrote:I imagine the NPC guards would be programmed to intervene anytime anyone was fighting within the city limits. This would mean that "friendly" duels would have to occur outside the walls of Trolls Bane. I see that as an inconvenience, but not an unreasonable one.

Normally sparring within the town is discouraged and is usually only tolerated by members of the guard and high ranking officials so that they are nearby in case they are needed.

Rainbird wrote:Normally, NPC guards would wander randomly through the town. When someone shouts for the guard within hearing distance of a guard, he would immediately come to the person who shouted. When a guard is attacked, or witnesses an attack, he would immediately sound an alarm (probably a horn carried by all guards) that can be heard throughout the town, which will attract all the other guards.

Again...what if the theif yells guard before the victim does...this leaves a lot of room for abuse and false accusations

Rainbird wrote: On witnessing any fighting, an NPC guard would initially give all combatants a warning, to "Stand down immediately". Guards would then engage any and all combatants with weapons in hand, until such weapons are sheathed or dropped.

I actually like this one.

Rainbird wrote:Under certain circumstances (character attacking/killing a guard, for instance), guards will forever after recognize certain characters as "wanted", and will always sound an alarm and attack such characters, on sight.

I really like this one...i understand how being killed when you are just starting out can leave a bad taste...Had it happen to me on the the first RP game played that hooked me...To be honest actually sending people to the cross is frowned upon by many...if they want o rob you they should give you the opportunity to hand over item under threat and you either would out of fear, or if you are brave and want to fight then going to the cross is a chance you are taking. but killing someone who isnt even a fighter and is unarmed, i find to be extremely unneccessary Unfortunately Trolls Bane is the start out for new players, and that includes the slash and kill types. I dont see NPC guards being added any time soon...but meh...you never know. I know something similar has been discussed to keep banned persons out of the town..

Juliana D'cheyne · Post by **Juliana D'cheyne** » Mon Jun 22, 2009 6:12 pm

Basically you are saying, there would be no fighting in towns at all, which has been proposed before. That anyone attempting to RP a thief/robber/general bad guy would forever be remembered and not allowed in town if banned (unless strong), IMO the actions of the guards sound very close to forced RP. You might as well just make a rule for the game "no fighting in Trolls Bane, no robbing, thievery etc." and call a GM if the rule is broken. The "game set" actions of the guards would also remove any RP between guard and thief with NPC's *shrugs*. Why make a thief if they can't RP thievery, why make a guard if you have NPC's?

So, my recommendation is to have 4-6 NPC town guardsmen on patrol in/around Trolls Bane, 24/7. These guardsmen should be mid-level strength; strong enough that noobies could never defeat them even one-on-one, but weak enough that truly powerful characters could wipe out all of them together (not sure if game mechanics allow for such a range; I hope it does).

This would severely limit the roleplay of those characters trying to be a thief, robber etc. it seems unless they PG their fighting skills, most of my thief chars had no skill and could be easily ghosted. Of course this would be convenient for those in town that would prefer not to have that "excitement". Most of this type of roleplay occurs in Trolls Bane because you usually can't find characters in other towns.

This is not the environment to introduce newcomers to ...

I can understand the difficulty however with new players. After awhile my characters learned to go to Trolls Bane prepared, and other towns were safer. Most of the time (and with good RP) I actually enjoy the diversion. The biggest problem IMO is poor RP leading up to it. Having made thief chars in the past, IMO it is obvious someone is not interested in the RP and I would go to someone else. Would letting a new player simply understand that Trolls Bane is not always "safe" help?

rainbird · Post by **rainbird** » Mon Jun 22, 2009 6:58 pm

Juliana D'cheyne wrote:Basically you are saying, there would be no fighting in towns at all, which has been proposed before. That anyone attempting to RP a thief/robber/general bad guy would forever be remembered and not allowed in town if banned (unless strong), IMO the actions of the guards sound very close to forced RP.

Actually, no ... I'm just saying no fighting in Trolls Bane. This would not limit thief RP ... what it should do, is cause much thief RP activity to move to other towns that are not as well guarded. Unusually strong and/or daring thieves would still "hit" Trolls Bane from time to time, but it would be lower frequency, giving noobies a more stable environment to adjust.

Also, the "forever" idea is not unrealistic. If a thief kills a person in Trolls Bane, then he should be hunted down and killed, on sight, in Trolls Bane. Plenty of evil characters would accept and even expect to be hunted by the authorities in some places. The weaker ones would just avoid those places, while the stronger ones would periodically come back to cause more havoc.

The biggest problem is that--as noted--this would not be a simple update. Might not even be possible with the current system. I don't know.

AlexRose · Post by **AlexRose** » Mon Jun 22, 2009 8:18 pm

Yes; it's been said.

Llama · Post by **Llama** » Mon Jun 22, 2009 10:10 pm

*clears throat*

It is not currently possible, given the AI that monsters follow - to produce an entity which only attacks a particular being/group of beings and nobody else.

*poofs*

rainbird · Post by **rainbird** » Tue Jun 23, 2009 12:16 am

Oh well. Tragedy averted, I guess.

Llama · Post by **Llama** » Tue Jun 23, 2009 9:29 am

That said , I've been suggesting ways of keeping bad guys out for ages-

Unfortunatly nobody seems to like the idea of making TB OOC-ed safe , no idea why. They've been trying to make the game more mainstream, and yet something basic like not getting newbies killed on the first day hasn't yet hit them

Unfortunatly, I can't find my proposal for door teleportation guards (my second one at least)

Ah well

Post by **Estralis Seborian** » Tue Jun 23, 2009 10:15 am

not getting newbies killed on the first day hasn't yet hit them

That's the reason why we have this board

.

The sentence above caught my attention. It is close to trivial to tag newbies in a way that they cannot be PKed or are treated differently by the fighting system. Any good ideas? Like e.g. instead of dying, they get "saved by the mercy of the gods" and are teleported to the cross immediatly?

It is also no big deal to make towns non combat zones. But is this intended? Is that what you want? Lure demons into towns and laugh at them? Running into town to avoid certain death by using technical advantages? Not being able to defend town against non-fighting agressors?

All in all, this proposal seems to be driven not by a motivation to raise the roleplaying experience but to find ways to get rid of ways to bend/violate the rules. It is clearly stated that newbies have to be treated friendly (=no PK) and that cooperative playing is mandatory. Those who don't behave get banned but only when you report them. So, think twice when you plan to take away a degree of freedom for everyone if you just want to act against a minority of players.

Do not hesitate to report players who spoil your fun. Us GMs are no evil warlocks that just wait for a report to ban people. We usually try to solve situations by offering our help and explaining why certain rules have to be obeyed.

Llama · Post by **Llama** » Tue Jun 23, 2009 11:33 am

Let me make my case:

Lets say I create a character, and I train him very well to be a fighter. I then decide that he's going to rob people in the middle of town.

Now I don't just randomly PK them, only if they don't give me their stuff - so I'm not just randomly PKing and its within the scope of the rules.

Now , lets say I rob enough people such that I succeed in making many people angry. The town puts a bounty on my head...

There are 3 cases that can happen without my consent.

Case 1 - A guy notices me, is a better fighter, PKs me and I die. I lose some skill (not too much), turn into a ghost and I'm unable to do anything for a few hours while I recover.

Case 2 - I never get caught.

Case 3 - I get caught by a town guard, I am put into jail for a week, I pop out again and return to robbing.
--

The main problem, as can be seen, is that there is no REAL PUNISHMENT avaliable ingame. You can't jail people for a long time - because that's not fun on the player. You can ban people from town, but they're under no compulsion to obey, since the worst thing they'll get is jail time.

So by conclusion - there needs to be a way to properly punish people who break the law IG - so that people who don't want to be fighters, or just want to roleplay, can do so in peace without the need of always being robbed, or assaulted.

Now the way this can be done is to barr people who have broken in law from the town, which was my main suggestion, and which is very fair in my opinion.

The other alternatives all involve griefing the player, and aren't very nice.

In real life, if you mugged people and stole a lot, you'd be hung in public - setting an example. Obviously we aren't allowed to do such a thing IG because of the rules, but we DO NEED TO BE ALLOWED HARSHER IG PUNISHMENTS.

Avalyon el'Hattarr · Post by **Avalyon el'Hattarr** » Tue Jun 23, 2009 11:57 am

Totally agreed with Goat Boy here, but as I heard implied consent was not agreed upon by the most GMs which kinda sucks. The best we can hope for are those labour camps which need to be scripted.

Joxia Doral · Post by **Joxia Doral** » Tue Jun 23, 2009 12:05 pm

Avalyon el'Hattarr wrote:Totally agreed with Goat Boy here, but as I heard implied consent was not agreed upon by the most GMs which kinda sucks. The best we can hope for are those labour camps which need to be scripted.

I was told that a labor prison is in the works that will be for the whole island to use. The criminals are given a certain amount of say ore to mine, no skill gain I hope for any jail task, once the job is completed and the material turned over, prisoner is automatically released. This will also cut down on the IG tag of trying to be online at the same time to release prisoners.

Llama · Post by **Llama** » Tue Jun 23, 2009 12:06 pm

Yeah, I've heard about the camp thing, however its not really any worse punishment than being shoved into jail.

In fact, if you're a good miner (like the kind that dig up maps regularly and don't want to get someone else) - you'll be out of there faster.

Post by **Estralis Seborian** » Tue Jun 23, 2009 12:46 pm

The best we can hope for are those labour camps which need to be scripted.

Scripting is done... for some months now...

Ingame punishments are a new topic. Any concrete ideas on this apart from forced perma ban? Mining 2500 piles of ore might keep some thugs pretty busy I think...

Llama · Post by **Llama** » Tue Jun 23, 2009 1:16 pm

Estralis Seborian wrote: Mining 2500 piles of ore might keep some thugs pretty busy I think...

I'm pretty sure that'll fall under the [griefing the player] option.

The best punishment I can think of is an engine-banning from town.

Joxia Doral · Post by **Joxia Doral** » Tue Jun 23, 2009 1:16 pm

What I want to see is if a PO makes a char that is going to commit a crime that by law is punishable by death/execution that the PO needs to expect it and go with it if they are caught and found guilty.

MagicMirror · Post by **MagicMirror** » Tue Jun 23, 2009 1:39 pm

not getting newbies killed on the first day hasn't yet hit them

I dont know, if it is possible of technical side, but here is my idea:

If a newbie is attacked, the attacker(s) get a message : It is better not to attack him...he has something...newbie-like on him.

Then the attacker knows: Oh hey that is a newbie, I'll be friendly to him.

Uhh...back to topic

Hu'greu · Post by **Hu'greu** » Tue Jun 23, 2009 1:50 pm

Joxia Doral wrote:What I want to see is if a PO makes a char that is going to commit a crime that by law is punishable by death/execution that the PO needs to expect it and go with it if they are caught and found guilty.

\

if your going to to do something like this then you will need to make it where criminals can also kill people for not turning in ransoms when somone gets kidnap, or they can kill you to take all your stuff.. whatever the reason may be for them to kill you

Juliana D'cheyne · Post by **Juliana D'cheyne** » Tue Jun 23, 2009 2:10 pm

I can see a few game scenarios depending on the idea decided:

A new player makes a thief/robber who is eventually punished like most will be, the punishment is not fun for the player so the player just deletes that char and makes another for the "fun" RP of a thief, or maybe just makes another not a thief this time. Also if the punishment is not fun any established char won't be a thief/robber. The game can immediately cut down on chars that go to this profession and most thieves/robbers will either be new players (i.e. less used to the game and possibly less used to RP), or if lucky an older player (hopefully with the tools to RP well) who just made a disposable char.

If the jail-time/punishment is fun for the player, you will have a cyclic version of the thief/robber when it is up not making much headway in curtailing the complaint of too much abundance of the profession however more likely to have chars that RP well considering the player has been longer in the game.

Some players may enjoy the monotonous click of "forced labor" basically those that seem to enjoy the PG more then the RP, however it seems to me, and I may be wrong.. that the object would be to encourage more and better RP for this profession. It takes good RP to be an adaquete thief/robber. Perhaps the best idea is to have this be a special application, or secretly talk to a GM who can allow or disallow this profession? *shrugs* I don't have the ultimate answer for those that want different things from the game, yet I see the thief/robber profession as a good opportunity for building RP skills and fun in the game for others if done well. Another idea is use one of the rarely seen towns, one that stays empty and make it a "thief town" rofl.. let the thieves rob from each other. Whatever is decided I would think that all players should enjoy the RP of the game, and there should be an "out" like other things in game (possibly even something like allowing the thief to be "converted" by a priest which would give more ideas to the coming priest magic system and provide an outlet for RP too).

A lot of good points are raised however in this thread, telling the thief/robber oocly it is a new player, if things are made "easier" for the town, they should be made "easier" for the thief also (which btw is almost impossible to earn much copper as a profession).

Vern Kron · Post by **Vern Kron** » Tue Jun 23, 2009 4:33 pm

Estralis Seborian wrote:
The best we can hope for are those labour camps which need to be scripted.
Scripting is done... for some months now...

Ingame punishments are a new topic. Any concrete ideas on this apart from forced perma ban? Mining 2500 piles of ore might keep some thugs pretty busy I think...

If such an idea is done, food will have to be provided to prisoners by an npc, as well as a 'stone for key' trade. And then it has to be an amount of stone that can be carried by the person. While a warrior might be able to carry fifty stones, a fairy would not be able to.

Personally, my opinion is this, and I will be hated for it I am sure.

You come into town. You are a bad guy, trying to hurt people. You get put in jail and the offense is enough to kill you with. The PO says no. Leave the character there until he starves. Atleast gives some characters something to complain about 'unfair treatment' of criminals now.

Why such a severe punishment? Because its obvious how the jail works. You get put in, and wait about 10 mins, and then log out. No one comes and checks. If some one manages escape, no one would know unless they had the courtesy of writing upon the board that they were missing. No roleplay. Its super boring. The GM's themselves have said that when alone, rp rules become a little less strict as long as it isn't outright pg'ing. So when you are in jail for a week, you just log off that character and do something else for a week.

Llama · Post by **Llama** » Tue Jun 23, 2009 6:25 pm

Fun fact:

"Thief" is the name of an allowed character start package - in my opinion that should be removed forthwith

AlexRose · Post by **AlexRose** » Tue Jun 23, 2009 6:53 pm

Change it to rogue

.

Post by **CJK** » Fri Jul 10, 2009 10:35 pm

Change it to 'Llama Man!'

In seriousness, it does need to be changed or even outright eliminated. Because IMO only noobs care about startpacks, and noob-tastic thieves really suck.

A lot.
They don't pay attention to any details, don't RP worth a load of sh** and PK like mad. Also they tend to do this nifty little trick of running away when a guard catches up to them and is typing a #me or something. It just isn't very good for anybody involved.

Now a more experienced player would likely not pay so much attention to start packs, or if they do they wouldn't pay much attention to names, just items and skills.