Okay,
It's been on my mind forever but in fear of giving away my character (something I HATE) I didn't want to post:
The current style of CTF warfare creates an environment where pk ability is first, last, and everything in between. With Ahmenes it took everything I had to find ways around the current CTF system in order to work politics and even then it was impossible in many situations.
There are two major problems that I see with it:
-
We have entire factions of cabals that are meant to be devoted to support/non-aggressive playstyle yet the system we're in is devoted to head to head combat. It's why you see so many Reavers compared to Pandemonium in Nexus, for example.
-
People who don't necessarily want to show their allegiance are forced to with the CTF system. There are a number of ways to definitively see that someone is involved with Cabal X.
How to fix it? I LOVED the jail idea for cabals, and I think reworking the army system a bit to be more engaging would be a boon. Create more support structures for players (generals) to engage in the army warfare. Maybe, for example, Pandemonium players get a skill that, when used in a room where there's an army battle, it confuses the enemy armies and men turn on each other. If the jail system is implemented maybe allow a public execution option in a contested area for bonus morale to your troops.
Also: for the shadowy cabals (nexus, syndicate) why force defense of things? If gameplay would have allowed for it, I would have never directly attacked or defended in cabal situations with Ahmenes because that wasn't how he worked. I diverted as much as possible as it was, but ultimately the current rule-set and expectation demands head-to-head action, which severely hinders your less open-combat oriented classes (thief, ninja, bard to start).
It's a rough start to an idea, but I really do think that we need to re-examine the way that this ONE system completely hinders so many avenues of roleplay. We all sit and wonder why so many "bloodthirsty" characters are rolled: ultimately I think its the ruleset we play under that creates the demand.
Yeah, this is up there on my list too.
Savant, for instance, is supposed to be a Tower based upon knowledge and the furthering thereof. However, during my 2 years+ tenure with Cylandas, the only thing I ever saw rewarded was PK ability. And that tended to boil down to the rather inane flag tag system we now have. I actually wanted the character to go in a different direction entirely, which I was doing with my countless scrolls and RP sessions, but to quote an old friend "Every time I think I'm out, they keep pulling me back in".
Pandy, Sigil, The Syndicate as a Whole, and probably Council get screwed here the most in that no matter how you may want to play your character (which seems to be in line with the help files, no less), you get dragged into cabal warfare like it or not.
Don't get be wrong. I LIKE Cabal Warfare, I just don't like doing it ALL THE TIME. It just seems so...limited..
The current style of CTF warfare creates an environment where pk ability is first, last, and everything in between. With Ahmenes it took everything I had to find ways around the current CTF system in order to work politics and even then it was impossible in many situations.
I agree here, the lack of polotical options can be difficult...but again, you are at WAR with the vendettad cabals. Work out peace, like you did with one of the nexus' vendettas.
- We have entire factions of cabals that are meant to be devoted to support/non-aggressive playstyle yet the system we're in is devoted to head to head combat. It's why you see so many Reavers compared to Pandemonium in Nexus, for example.
you see so many reavers vs Pandemonium because the reaver abilities are very very powerful, and easy to utilize in combat. Trust me when I say, a Pandemonium is NOT meant to be passive at ALL. You can choose to b that way I geuss, but even one of their abilities involes apeasing a demon by murdering people!
- People who don't necessarily want to show their allegiance are forced to with the CTF system. There are a number of ways to definitively see that someone is involved with Cabal X.
I think hiding allegiance should be removed all together (except for syndicate). Normally offensive cabals have all these covert members leading armies when their enemies arent online. Why do people get into these organizaitons? just to hide it from everyone.