Afterlife Overhaul?

[Waffuru]

You're not going to win Heaven/Hell's favor by being NEUTRAL. Use Dragonballz?

[Tyr]

That makes sense. Besides that, any chance that neutral peops can get some nice lewt/rewards of some kind? Maybe some sort of Limbo quests or something?

[Waffuru]

Yeah, I might be able to come up with something.

But do people really roll True Neutral?

[Jonathan Meer]

It should be pointed out that karma is only in relation to actions, and not motives.

Neutral people act in moral ways. If it is known IC that earning karma requires consistent actions of a particular moral flavor, I don't think neutral people would really have a problem here.

[Vad]

It should be pointed out that karma is only in relation to actions, and not motives.

Neutral people act in moral ways. If it is known IC that earning karma requires consistent actions of a particular moral flavor, I don't think neutral people would really have a problem here.

This is what I was trying to get at in my sleep deprived stupor...

[Tyr]

Yeah, I might be able to come up with something.

But do people really roll True Neutral?

I am going to create a character(soon™) which should lie close to true neutral, or at least do both side's quests which regardless would put me low if I went for "high" quests. I do understand how this makes balancing a pain however, if it's just too much work I'll figure out something.

[Jonathan Meer]

This is what I was trying to get at in my sleep deprived stupor...

I guess I should here mention that I haven't really been reading the thread all that closely =p

Too many walls of text.

[Kaden]

It should be pointed out that karma is only in relation to actions, and not motives.

Quoting for truth.

Example: you're on Kajin Rala and you pass through a village. Suddenly the village comes under attack by a group of Arlians. Your character slaughters them all because he wants to eradicate the Arlian race and, in doing so, saves the village. You'd end up getting positive Karma for the act, but that definitely doesn't mean you're a "good guy."

[Tyr]

But then because you're an evil bastard you wipe them all out for valuables ending with a fat 0. It seems to me that without any semi-neutral rewards, it nullifies choice just like it did in all the games with karma systems. Fable 3 would have been a great game if it didn't shout out which choice was good or bad because there was a lot of punishment now, later reward- choices which were just counted as evil despite being the most sensible at the time.

[Vad]

Sounds like you're suggesting a Paragon/Renegade system.

[Juno]

I like the karma system, and I vote for being able to earn karma both while alive and dead.

Just thought I'd throw my opinion out there. I also like Alex's thing (someone else mentioned it too, I think) of the cost to revive disintegrating by how long you've been dead, but I also think that it should descrease faster than the model Alex presented. Three months is a long time.

EDIT: Hell yes to Paragon/Renegade system. Mass Effect's morality system was the best one ever created.

[Jonathan Meer]

But then because you're an evil bastard you wipe them all out for valuables ending with a fat 0.

We were talking primarily about the karma system with regard to neutral characters.

It's pretty silly* to think that every morally significant action has an equal and opposite component.

* Other words to consider in place of 'silly': untenable, absurd, hilarious, inconsistent with the history of philosophy, deviant, unrealistic

[Tyr]

EDIT: Hell yes to Paragon/Renegade system. Mass Effect's morality system was the best one ever created.

Nooo, same issue!

If you have completed Mass Effect 2, feel free to click:
[spoiler]At the massive brainwash/genocide, it's explicitly decided what is paragon and what is renegade, despite both choices being very debatable. It's the same deal. I know some may say murder is beyond brainwashing, but if I lose who I am, I want to lose my body with me and not have a faded image of me toppling around knowing it is me without being me.[/spoiler]

Also I mean, if you were evil that'd butt you over as well. You kill Arlians because you hate them but because you have a relatively big IQ for a racist sonovabish you deal with them first because numbers overwhelm them (for the sake of this example anyway), but you're also a greedy sonovabish so you turn around and whoop their ass for their lewt leaving the village 4dead.

[Jonathan Meer]

To take another tack against that line of argument, Leo, I'd argue that that particular string of actions, which you have isolated into two separate karma-relevant objects, would be better understood as one individual object.

Suppose a village is being assaulted by bandits, and you jump into the fray. You first kill a bandit. Following the death of that bandit, you kill a villager, then another bandit, then two more villagers. The karmic evaluation of your actions here are not isolated with particular values given to each death, with +2 karma given to your initial kill (that of the bandit), and -2 given for the following death of the villager. Rather, the action is taken as a whole. As a whole, it is clearly evil.

Yes, there's subjectivity here, and yes, I'm certain you can construct some example that points at a seam in this particular system, but that example will necessarily be contrived and ridiculous, and even if it had to be overcome, it could easily be accounted for by a reasonably intelligent Staff member who applies the karma system with leeway-room.

[Vad]

Two forms of Karma would solve this. Otherwise you'd just be awarded whatever type of Karma points you get for completing the quest you took.

[Piper Juunanagou]

Hmm, sounds familiar <_<

[Waffuru]

Suppose a village is being assaulted by bandits, and you jump into the fray. You first kill a bandit. Following the death of that bandit, you kill a villager, then another bandit, then two more villagers. The karmic evaluation of your actions here are not isolated with particular values given to each death, with +2 karma given to your initial kill (that of the bandit), and -2 given for the following death of the villager. Rather, the action is taken as a whole. As a whole, it is clearly evil.

Exactly what I was going to say.

To really be neutral you'd have to just stay out of it completely.

[Dr. Cringle]

On the karma loan thing, would there be consequences for not paying off the loan? Maybe say Hell gives you a loan, and expects you to pay back the karma in a certain amount of time. Your character decides 'pff, whateve' and just roleplays as normal without any attempt to accrue negative karma. You going to have some bookie devil come to break his toes or something or drag his butt back to the underworld?

[Tyr]

I just grabbed for the lowest branch in that example; I do in fact mean on a quest-by-quest basis. Is the reward depending how you completed it or is it a pre-set reward?

Also Waff perhaps neutral was the wrong thing to go for, but it was always what I ended up with in these type of karma systems. I would do a playstyle for "good", "evil" and then "hardcore me", where I would only do what I found logical within my limits of "evil". Usually ended up with a few points over or under the limit.

[Piper Juunanagou]

Is having a roster page that says: "Karma: (+) X / (-) Y" too complicated? You get positive karma for good things and negative karma for evilly things, and when you spend that shit, the respective one goes down. And if someone gives a shit to look at their character in the grand scheme, they can do simple math. Wouldn't that be a simpler course of action than bickering over the meaning of neutrality ? >_>