Shattered Kingdoms

So, here's an idea:

Real characters in stories change and develop. This is a crucial part of any story-telling. Most good stories have at least some corruption of redemption.

Alignments are rarely changed in the world of SK and last the character's whole lifetime.

Instead of cursing people for acting outside of their alignment, why don't we just change their alignment, with or without their own player initiative?

This would seem cooler than just saying, 'screw you, go grind more levels.'

Here's a stick, horse is over there.

Changing alignment should be a very carefully considered thing. I have heard that is possible but that it takes a long time and requires a lot of SUSTAINED RP. It shouldn't be something given to a character on a whim. I would suggest you dialog with the imms on this one if you are seeking an alignment change. Seek advice and guidance.

It would be interesting if there as some sort of meter to determine how good/bad your character is. You perform "good deeds" and your meter sways one way. One would not be able to even discuss an alignment change if their meter was solid in the dark range or tipping the scales to the light side. It would require a bit of coding, so it's not likely. Just a thought.

Alignment change is something that Dulrik basically frowns on. He's commented on this in various places/times through the forums, I'd hate to paraphrase right now his general reasoning. This *IS* something that can happen on very, very, very rare occasion, with appropriate RP.

When it does happen, you won't see any elves going gray/dark, or deep-elves going gray/light, etc. But a shift from one same-aura alignment to another may be possible with good enough reason. It wouldn't come cheap or easy though.

Which effectively means that the only 'possible' alignment changes are relatively pointless, for being such a monumental taboo undertaking.

95% of the alignment things you'll get punished for are strict to light/grey/dark, not specific alignments (like lighties can't kill lighties). And of the 5% of things that can get you cursed, it's mostly affected by outside factors (like, you didn't get cursed for doing X as a Principled character, really, you got cursed for doing X as a paladin/priest of love/whatever).

Edit : Would be interesting to see more IC punishments for IC actions, rather than 'bam you lose five levels' which is a really ooc punishment for ic actions, like maybe a misbehaving lightie loses access to request because people have heard about his [REDACTED] reputation.

I found Gedyarf's recent curse (assume he got cursed since it got posted in afterlife punishments), kind of [REDACTED]. Not sure how it's "bad roleplay" for an evil shaman to kill some of his guards for a magical artifact. A tarnish from his Tribunal would have made sense, but a curse, even a small one, seems [REDACTED].

Just goes to show that you can't actually roleplay evil in this game.

I see 0 problem with an evil character killing people in his tribunal for said reasoning. It's like saying Voldemort killing Snape for his mistaken belief that it would give him control of the elder wand was bad writing. But it'll always come down to the argument of

I also disagree with that punishment Gedyarf received. Especially considering how good the item is that he was going for. I can see a lightie getting punished for it, but a darkie tribunal leader? If the war party NPCs were something the tribunal could merely order, that'd eliminate any problems right there. This seems like common sense to me. I have never been able to understand NPCs which represent the guards of the kingdom and yet we are unable to order them (as a member of the tribunal they represent).

I've never heard of this curse before, either. The only reason I can see a darkie getting cursed for this would be an aberrant doing this in violation of an oath. The described action is perfect miscreant or diabolic behavior. This curse seems pretty Cartman to me, though I guess I'm not immediately familiar with the situation.

Anyway, 'go grind more levels' doesn't solve much, either.

So, yeah. Too much punishment, negative game environment. If you think XYZ character isn't acting in the mold you've set out for him, don't try to push him into a mold that he has to stay in his entire life, regardless of how events develop the character.

In fact, Gedyarf IS aberrant.