Player Polarization

[AayJay]

I have a concern. If the Justice system is going to use a vote good or evil to determine societal acceptance in towns ect... then once guilds start to get established would there be a strong possiblity of polarization to occur?

I mean this: some not so nice players start to band together simply because they have to. They start to vote nice for each other and bad for particular individuals and groups. So now "accurate" reporting is not an issue now its making sure you join a guild so you can protect your Karma rating. This could quite clearly escalate to a two sided affair. One basically one to counter the other. (Our-U.S.-political system for example. Third parties will either get powerful enough to absorb the weaker previous dominant party or will be absorbed by one of the two dominant partys. It cannot sustain more than two parties in a winner takes all system.)

Do you see my worry. The original intent spun out of control to a massive two association system. Basically a giant war. I don't think this extreme example would happen but banning together to protect your Karma will occur. And PK behavior may run rampant in such a system.

Any thoughts on this?

[Su'ulMorda]

Possible, Let us see if there will be an "invisible hand" to guide the system...

[Kintoun]

That situation would actually prove very interesting... The "invisible hand" could just make the guldmaster to choose a Good, Bad or Nuetral guild as a prerequesit to creating a guild. That way there can be diversity among this polarization. But of course we'll all have to wait and see how the "voting" flows in the Beta first...

[Wrentia]

OK, lets take these issues one at a time....

"some not so nice players start to band together simply because they have to. They start to vote nice for each other and bad for particular individuals and groups. So now "accurate" reporting is not an issue now its making sure you join a guild so you can protect your Karma rating."

But it IS accurate....just for arguments sake, lets say there are 2 guilds, and everyone is either part of one or the other. Guild one has 70 percent of the population while the other has 30 percent. If you are part of the smaller guild and 70 percent of the population thinks you are evil, then you are....Perhaps not your definition of evil, but the "popular" definition. Also, remember that the more reports that one person makes, the less weight they carry. So if the big guild makes a report on everyone in the small guild daily, while the small guild makes a report on everyone in the big guild monthly, things would probably even out if not shift in favor of the small guild.


"This could quite clearly escalate to a two sided affair. One basically one to counter the other. "

Well, only if there were 2 guilds. But there won't be. Also, people as a whole aren't all good or all evil, they are somewhere in between. And the karma system will reflect that. Let's say you tick some lamer off who gets his little buddies together to ruin your karma. Well if they keep doing it, it will carry less weight (ie. That lamer is always complaining about something....just ignore it). While if you keep going about you're goody goody ways by helping newbies, healing people, etc....you will generate reports that will more than counter the effects of the lamer. Remember, there will be people who strive to be the biggest "evil" bastard they can be, and there will be just as many holier than thou types shinning their halo around. The rest of us will be somewhere in between. Just like in real life.


"The original intent spun out of control to a massive two association system. Basically a giant war. I don't think this extreme example would happen but banning together to protect your Karma will occur. And PK behavior may run rampant in such a system."

Well, the beta will help refine the karma system. Any new idea will have bumps along the path to glory...:) Banning together to protect your karma happens in real life, its called making friends. PK Behavior will have more deterants that just a bad karma. It won't be pleasant to be a hunted person the second you log on. It will also be difficult to raise in level when every goody goody is hunting you down.

-Wrentia

[z_man93]

Not too worried about this.
First thing is that you should not be making bad reports just because someone is in a rival guild. From my understanding reports are only to be used here and there to report extraordinary situations.
Like if you were ambushed and getting romped by a few goblins and and some wizard (who would not normally engage a monster directly) comes up and slaps one of the goblins to distract it and give you a way out, then you might write a good report because he went out-of-his-way and possibly risked his life to save yours. Where as, if he just stood there laughing at you while you died, then you would probably write a bad report.
Now, if your rival guild had weekly meetings to decide who in your guild they were all going to vote against,then those who are voting regularly would carry little weight.
Or, there was mention of posting bounty and too do so it must be approved by local officials. Maybe reports could be filed the same, and need approval from local officials.