Afterlife Overhaul?

[Alexander Trafford]

If you do good shit, you get positive Karma points. If you do bad shit, you get negative Karma points. I'm not sure how that can be confusing. If you're neutral you'll still be doing things, you won't just be doing nothing. As long as you are performing actions, then whichever side of the aisle those actions land on, then those are the points you gain. If your character is walking grannies across the street, then capping kids with your nine ten seconds later, then perhaps the problem isn't the system, but that your character has absolutely zero consistency.

[Victoria]

Think of it as numbers, not a mechanic to define your character, if you're neutral. For a neutral character it will be nothing more than a means to decide where you go and how you get out of that place. That's how I see it.

Really my character is mostly neutral, and her job is...good but not good at all. She kills bad people. So the act of killing would no doubt give her negative, but killing a child molester could give her positive karma. Either way, I won't let it affect who she is, she's just...Victoria.

[Shane Warnock]

Loving the idea of good/bad karma points.

[Alexander Trafford]

Think of it as numbers, not a mechanic to define your character, if you're neutral. For a neutral character it will be nothing more than a means to decide where you go and how you get out of that place. That's how I see it.

Really my character is mostly neutral, and her job is...good but not good at all. She kills bad people. So the act of killing would no doubt give her negative, but killing a child molester could give her positive karma. Either way, I won't let it affect who she is, she's just...Victoria.

I'm not sure if you were trying to clarify this for me or not, because I definitely understand what's being said and I support the idea and agree with you.

[Victoria]

Nah just throwing my two cents out there.

[Vad]

Do we want one number or two? To finalize that question.

[Victoria]

I think that I like the -/+ idea. You get + points and - points for certain quests and so you go up or down.

So I just did a quest to save a school full of kids. I get +200 karma for it. We could then say if I did a quest to slaughter a hospital, I'd get -500 karma. So that leaves me at -300. Then we could say, based off that, I end up in Hell?

That might be cool.

[Piper Juunanagou]

I like separate plus and minus values -> Karma: (+) X / (-) Y. The values are independent on of one another. I think it'd be less complicated that way.

[Jarka]

I , personally, prefer a unified currency (+/- karma). It makes more sense to me for character development and in universe explanations.

Heaven/Hell wouldn't want to release a person from their grasp until they felt they were the epitome of good/evil. Why would they be like, "Oh, you're super good, so even though you're -800 evil as well, we think you learned your lesson!"

Two currencies just feels a bit too wishy washy for me. It's not like people are hold two opinions on everybody, our opinion goes up and down with their actions.

However, I can see how two might be less complicated for staff and users and such. Truthfully, I'm pretty indifferent.

[Victoria]

What Jarka said...I think it would make more sense for it to go up and down, but if it will be easier for members and staff to have both... *shrug*. I'm not horribly bothered either way, I just really like the whole idea.

[Piper Juunanagou]

If it goes up and down, couldn't I just spend all my negative karma whenever I decide to 'turn face'? (as they would say in the professional wrestling business) I don't think that makes much sense =(

Perhaps using 'karma' as the title of a currency isn't the best avenue?

[Victoria]

Hmm if we use two numbers, your higher value of Karma would be the one that is currently at play. So if I have +500/-600 I'd be considered "evil". I'd go to Hell, and in order to get out I'd have to reach a certain amount of evil Karma in order to leave. Making mine like... +500/-1200 just for an example, once I leave.

We would have to then continue to up the number every time a person dies, and in order to clear their slate they would have to do more good quests to get over that -1200 if they ever want to go to heaven.

[Piper Juunanagou]

Wouldn't it be better if these things were just coins?

I mean, I think the concept of karma is interesting, but wouldn't it be a lot simpler to execute the original idea (afterlife-specific shops for dead people to enrich their experience, yadda yadda yadda) if they're a simple currency, rather than vague, philosophical values? Then there'd be no need to do math or discuss the cosmic morality of the character. =/

[Kaden]

I still don't think forcing another currency into the system is going to work out.

[Belle Hibiki]

I'd agree with that.

[Ashe]

I still don't think forcing another currency into the system is going to work out.

It somewhat defeats the point of the system going out of its way to convert to a unified payment system, but its also not the first game I've seen do that and immediately add another currency after cleaning the rest up.

[Alexander Trafford]

I think the real, practical problem with Karma points, especially if they are going to be gained outside of the afterlife as well, is that literally everything on this site will need to be read and graded for positive or negative karma points, as any action that you do could affect your +/- scale, and, let's be serious, unless Vad has nothing to do shit takes absolutely forever to get updated around here. I mean, if the current update-load can't be handled, what's going to happen when every post for 12-15 members needs to be read and graded?

[Kaden]

There are easily ways to deal with that. The simplest being that we only award Karma points for completed quests; if the quest was a "good" quest then they would get +Karma and if it was a "bad" quest they would get -Karma.

That isn't a big issue, really.

[Sigfried Hunin]

May incorporate it into the exp system with the C&C system I THINK we're going to?

It's exp either way but you have + exp and - exp or some shit... I don't fuckin know. >_>

[Kaden]

May incorporate it into the exp system with the C&C system I THINK we're going to?

Right.

Not saying that's going to happen, mind, I'm just saying that's a simple of way of dealing with the issue of having to grade everything.

Does it make sense for only some actions to affect your Karma? Canonically, no, not really. Mechanically? Yes. Yes it does.