Re: Possible solution to the new player retention problem...
My thoughts on Haven:
At first its a very good idea, however I think vet chars should be FORBIDDEN to enter unless they sign up for "mentoring", that would be signing up and then be randomly assigned to a new player, which they would help. This would be optional on both sides (so a well seasoned player just starting on gamers wouldnt likely need any help). At the end of the mentoring process (lasting an arbitrary amount of time), the newbie would be presented with an automated poll asking if his mentor was good, this would serve to rate a mentor, and the higher their score, the better reward he would get (rewards being irrelevant, just things like a blessed sash "I help newbies"). A mentor getting negative score (for being a jerk) would be disqualified to sign up again.
This way newbies get help, players get to help, everyone meets people and vets get a little something for their time (which cant be attained otherwise).
On a side note: mentors wouldnt be able to interact with Haven or leave it until the mentoring time has expired or both him and his pupil resigned from the whole thing.
Haven + Mentors = Supreme. (Credit given to Jenova, who suggested it 1st)
On statloss:
Ok, the whole Haven thing wont stop the PK rampage. Sure, complete newbies would be safe for a week, but it wouldnt stop the fucktard teens from running in with explo precast and ganking blues 5 on 1.
I think there must be something to deter the murderers, being it more aimed at the griefing pks than the real ones.
There has to be consequences for being a murderer, as there are for being a thief or for venturing out of town alone.
That answer is not statloss, but a new status.
Enter the Trammie status (just making up a name for it). When a player gets over an arbitrary amount of short terms counts (lets say 5) and dies, instead of being subject to statloss, they would be in Trammie status.
The rules for Trammie status would be very similar to the ones of statloss, but instead of losing skills, players would lose the ability to attack innocent (blue) players until their counts wore off. So, they would still be able to attack grays, reds and other "trammies", but would not be able to initiate negative actions on blue players.
This way, when a red is killed, instead of losing their hard-earned skills (cough) or needing to macro his char for hours, they would just be harmless to the blues for a given amount of time.
Also, trammies would highlight a different color (i suggest pink) and have a [Trammie] stuck to their names for the duration of the status.
And please don't complain about blues being able to attack "trammies" freely, because that would make the blues gray to the victim, and therefore freely killable. A "trammie" would be able to defend himself, just not run rampant for a while.
Even more, when a blue attacks a "trammie", he becomes gray to all other trammies, this way pvp is not hurt, only mindless pking is. With this new status, the "victim playerbase" would get some relief, as pks would be put out of the pking business for a short time, thus reducing the ammount of blues ganked / hour.
To sum it up: instead of taking away their stats, take away their ability to grief newbies.
Why would i like it to be "trammie" status? To add insult to injury i guess
YES TO HAVEN! YES TO MENTORS! YES TO TRAMMIE STATUS!
Yeah, i suck, the trammie status is crazy, griefers have the divine right to ruin other people's game (sarcasm)
PS: and add the damn bounty boards, goddamit!
EDIT: Or instead, just add the penal colony thing, that would be much cooler without having to modify acknowledged and proven game rules.
