Shattered Kingdoms

Letting banishment be used willy-nilly is an instant non-starter. At least before it took an actual crime. On the other hand, I'd be willing to see guards act more reasonably against enemy races. Why my old griffon character could just flap by the guards at Krychire and the Moot escapes me.

As for bounty NPCs - that's one of the ways a city can be strong, and it should be to the exclusion of some others. I think if you have bounty NPCs like Zhenshi's, you should have guards like Zhenshi's too. Does that make the tribunal too weak in active PK? Then improve the comparative spells/utility available through the guards.

There's a lot of ways to make cities work better, while retaining their character. I'm generally against blanket proposals like the OP's.

I have multiple thoughts about this. I really like most of it, except for banishment. I love the top-five/top-ten idea. That would really balance out banishment. I would really love bounty NPCs taken out, and a bounty system put in instead. Here is my latest idea on it.

All, bounty NPCs gone. What you have in place instead is this. If you kill someone in a country in which they are outlawed in and you are not (and you are not at war with), you can turn the corpse into the judge to get a 24hr boon. What spell it would be, I don't know. I was thinking of something like on the level of prayer.

If you stun somebody, under the same conditions as above, you can say a command like: bounty <name of stunned person in room>. You would give a tell to the local NPCs to send guard NPCs to your location (starting from the judge at run speed). Which would then arrest the person in question. The stunned person would get the effect of immobilization. The Judge would reward the party with coin and a boon for 24hrs.

I completely agree that bounty NPCs should be almost entirely removed from the game but there should be a few/some in the cities.

I think the top five most wanted is an excellent idea! Let the players do the killing of the criminals and collect coin at the local law office.

On a side note I also agree that the NPC aid of PK is insane at the moment, completely ruins the possibility to defend a city and spoils some of the fun too.

Outlaw list

WANTED DEAD OR ALIVE

*Top five banished*

See judge for contracts.

If you implement a limited most wanted concept, then you have to allow for an easy way for players to see where they are 'wanted'. For this reason: a trib leader could put you on the wanted list, then remove you in favor of another criminal, but you wouldn't know that you were off the list as there is currently no way to tell without visiting the country where you are outlawed.

If there were a more useful and widespread mercenary or assassin guild, then maybe the astral boards in the guild could reflect changes in law status as leaders update their wanted lists.

N_G

This kind of system would make an assassin's guild more usable.
I wonder if the rewards should be fixed, changable by the tribunal leader
or determined by the amount of people you've killed.
I can see the last being exploited

I dunno guys, I suggested a player-driven outlaw system years ago and it got a pretty firm "no". I'm not saying it's not a bad idea, I'm just saying it's unlikely to be implemented.

The banish idea isnt necessarily a bad one, but when you're fighting a tribunal with over 20 active members, most all wanted for high murder....They are all a detriment. Say you can narrow the banishment down to say 5. What about the other factions you are at war with?

Just hope they aren't turning themselves in. That's why it's such a good idea.

I'd be fine with keeping banishment the way it is,
if it were possible to sneak around in cities/wilderness.
Unfortunately, the bounty NPCs make that a little difficult.
Make the vendors unable to see through poly/disguise.
Remove bounty NPCs.
Make some guards that intercept criminals once they're spotted
(meaning also, put more scout guards in the wilderness. Give us a chance
to avoid them, instead of making them spawn out of nowhere).
Make guards more placable, maybe make a "stay" order (though
that may be a bit too overpowered, even if it makes sense).