Am I on the right server ?

I am brand new to the forums and I am relatively new to the server having been invited by another player a few months ago. He told me this was a "Christian" server and pointed to all of the references found in books and said that "evil" characters had a hard time here and it was easier to play good or at least non-evil. He left the server, but I stayed because I enjoy trying to advance different builds to see how well I do. I have 6 or 8 toons and mostly play alone because I like to test myself with the exception of some great help from some great players that have been truly generous. I had thought, "what a great server", until Monday night when I was pp'd of practically everything I had on that toon and then killed while in battle with some undead in D2. In the defense of the offender, I think he must have mis-clicked while pping me again and killed me by accident. I found out later that same night that another player was also tapping me via pp. Apparently preying on the weak and defenseless is regular sport on this server.

After that I resolved to stock up on Thief Stops for each toon and re-log every 10 minutes or so to check if there were any rogues logged in at all as the only sure way to defend against such abuse against low level toons. I sat in the swap chest room for a couple of hours last night and never left it while I watched a war between Rogue types and other players played out in retaliation and retribution. Massive PvP all about. The pitiful time penalty for prison stays was completely ineffectual. I had invited another friend, a new player to KT and had to tell her we couldn't play because of the PvP wars, so we left for another server.

I just read another post in this forum called "harrassment" that ran along similar mean-spirited PvP lines and decided I must be seeing a trend for this server. While I have met and been helped by a number of very good and kind players, I and my friend are not really interested in playing on a PvP server disguised as a "Christian" server where you have to be paranoid of who is going to virtually rape you next.

So can anyone tell me if I am just getting the wrong impression based on a very rare set of occurrences or if I should just line up my toons for deletion and move on to another server?

What would you have me tell my friend that I begged to join me on KT who hates PvP servers?

Is there any plans to stiffen the penalties for miscreant behavior or the defenses of the defenseless?

It is a shame that there are players out there that prey on low level toons. Players like that are either just scumbags who like to prey on the weak or just noobs that cant do well in higher dungeons because they suck as players. The designer is a Christian hence the biblical referances but it doesnt mean the players are. PVP is naturally allowd because it symbolizes a battle between good and evil (an evil toon doesnt care about becoming more evil so that toon would freely murder, steal etc.) Unforunately due to an imense amount of bitching and moaning from players that play evil champs the one way to control players that harass the weak has been taken out of the server.

KT1 was better for controlling garbage like that from staying too long on the server since what player likes getting killed over and over by a more powerful toon? Without a full time dm as well there is no way to track that player's actions and force that player to quit being a prick and give back at least the most important items stolen off the character and the Knight's Templar that were on KT1 were able to at least help protect the weak level players while they just have fun and leveled their toon. Most people like Caudata and his friend come to the server to play and have fun and that is impossible to do when there are players out there that will strip you of all the gear you worked so hard to get.

I am the friend Caudata is refering to and it was I who recommended the server to him because it is a fun, challenging and mostly friendly server to play on. Unfortunately there are a few players that are not friendly and just about every single way of dealing with them is gone except for another player bringing on a level 60 with true seeing to escort low levels through dungeons out of party when rogues are playing. To those level 60 toons Im sure that would be pretty boring and it should not be necessary.

If this crap continues I would suggest you bring the Knight's Templars back Sarah to deal with these players who are making playtime shit for these players who are here to have fun.

I wouldn't say these are rare occurrences. We tend to get behavior like this in waves, and the longest wave I've seen to date was about a month long. I'm sorry you had to go through this garbage; it's happened to me as well. I hope you'll stick out the rough, because then the good comes back in waves ten times in size (we've had at least a dozen miscreants leave the server because they got bored not being able to 'hurt' us).

The PvP and PP is allowed, and is punished in game by scripts (but we need better players to punish those mis-behavors). What I think should be done is for Sarah to take more action against those who harass people through shout and tells. It is most unfortunate that a player can't be booted or even temporary-banned for calling someone a "____ing _____ ____face ____head ___wipe _____ ____" over and over again through tells.

I take issue with some of the assumptions made by the OP and follow-up posters, but do so in a respectful manner.

Quick note first: I do not condone rudeness (swear laden PMs, insults, or griefing) and I try hard when on some of my evil characters to NOT be like that...just FYI.

Now to get back to my points:
-The "Christian Mentality" equals "nice/firendly" kind of confuses me. This isn't a chatroom, club, or rally that was made for a specific purpose such as spreading the gospel or teaching one to do upon others as et. al. This is a VIOLENT GAME designed around combat, magic, and monsters. If you want to subtley skew it one way to represent some ideals, which I think Sarah has, then feel free...but there is a limit you have to conform to when using a game designed for something so alien to Christian values. Simply said, the GM chose this system/world to operate in, don't complain if it is too chaotic/evil-ridden/negatively-influenced to suit your wants...find a GM that has taken something like SIMS or another avatar-driven game and used the more adaptable tools and world to fit your desires.
-There are more ways to stop thieves on this server than any other I've ever seen. Whether its the 5,000 different ways to aquire True Seeing, the cheap thief stops, or the fact that a prison area even exists is proof of that. The game was DESIGNED to have thieves and for that to be a hurdle to climb over for each player...just because you don't like it doesn't mean we change how the game was designed/intended. It's not the community or the game that has to change, it's you. Personally I don't like Druids and think the current incarnation in the game is an abomination that doesn't even come close to representing what they should be....does that mean I can holler enough till they disappear, regardless of what others feel?
-There is nothing stopping all of the other players from hunting down thieves and eleminating them. Because they choose not to, please don't then take it out on the thieves.
-For the size of the server and the number of players we have coming on/coming back, I'm surprised that there aren't more thieves. The thief population is relatively low, and the times thieves are actually running around stealing also pretty low. Sure, the prime times of Fri/Sat nights will show a few on, but 90% of the time its all monks and wizards.

Lastly: Can we refrain from throwing insults out at those who play thieves? You may think that they are "low-life" bullies, bitches, etc... but thats your opinion and may not be true at all. Thanks.

Sorry if I offended anyone; I did not think I called any names.

I don't find thieves bad people, I find those who PP clean lowbies in D2 bad people. That's just low.

Neverwinter Nights isn't incompatible with Christian principles. In fact, it mirrors the real world. Good players can gather together to help each other against players who choose to be evil. With all due respect to my Lord, He gives people the right to choose evil or good.

As noted, I think KT penalizes thievery and murder more than most. Just like in real life, civilization works against a player who chooses to steal and kill. For example, if someone has a reputation for stealing, merchants won't want to deal with them. On the other hand, good players get all sorts of discounts and benefits.

Use Thief Stop. It's inexpensive and effective (no one has reported differently). Fill several rows of inventory with the stuff, and the thief will be more likely to steal one.

As for bringing back the Templars, paladins are allowed. Anyone can choose to make one and go thief hunting.

Well, I have concluded that I must NOT be on the right server, I have never, never been on a server with so many problems with players victimizing other players or been targetted so frequently myself.

Tonight, I had my transfer chest cleaned out while I was standing there and had my death drop stolen. At least this time I know that it was the player that has toons called "Monkey". I wasn't sure before, but a few days ago I was missing a gem from a transfer chest while he was standing there. Now I am sure. Both times he said, "It wasn't me" and just stood there waiting for anything worth looting. He spends a lot of time begging for Rusty set items too, and tries to find out where you are by party invites. I am not sure but I think he has a friend that seems to be around when he is. Spidey I think, but him I am not sure about. Monkey has high level toons and can get to you in epic dungeons as this was where I died and he told me he had my loot . . . then logged with it.

Bottom line is that no feeble, 20 minute time-out is going to even slow this kind of behavior. PvP attacks won't help either. It's damn hard to even identify someone until they get brazen about it.

And this server is hard enough to get loot until you have a toon able to do the post-40 levels (I have ONE that has only just gotten past 40.)

I am told that this has been happening on this server for a long time and I have to believe that it is tacitly endorsed since it is not very aggressively discouraged.

The module and it's coding are great. The skill of Sarah to script is very great. I have met some very nice and generous helpful people, but I have to say, I can probably find other servers where I won't get robbed blind every week. In fact, I have never been on one like this before and I have played for years.

I can't believe anyone would want to play on a server that you had to look over your shoulder all the time expecting to be robbed or killed by another player at any moment.

I hope you leave this post up as a warning to other potential players for this server to be prepared to be abused periodically if you want to play on this server.

Ok I would just like to say a couple things

- I have not noticed any better or worse behavior on KT then anywhere else in regards to thieves, PvP, etc. In fact, I have seen noticeably less of that sort of behavior then at any other point for any of the incarnations of the server
- Whether you think 20 minutes in jail is not a good deterrent, well, thats your opinion. Many servers have no sort of penalty so that 20 minutes is something.
- transferring items via the chests while someone else is standing there is a patently stupid thing to do. If you do not know the person standing there, YOU are taking the risk by transferring items. I hope you were aware that there is no penalty for stealing items from chests so they are a sort of use at your own risk proposition.
- I dunno what servers you are used to playing on but in my experience it it fairly easy to find loot on KT. Of course the best loot doesnt drop until after level 40..it would be pretty stupid if you got the best loot before then.
- It is actually quite simple to detect who is naughty and who is nice..try using your rod of detection sometimes.

I am sorry your experience wasn't what you were looking for. I hope you find somewhere more to your liking.

Nuli

Hey Nuli,

You must be playing on very different servers than I do if the stuff that has been happening to me on KT is perfectly normal to you. But I don’t play on those PvP servers where the players spend all of their time hunting and killing each other. I did play on a Nordock server for a long time that saw its share of problems, but there were a lot of DMs to keep things in check and players were banned by NWN code if they became abusive. Try playing 12ds and I can guarantee you won’t have the problems there are here. Of course the primary server is no PvP, but the other two linked servers are Party PvP like this one and this just doesn’t happen. They do have DMs part of the time, though and things aren’t set up to allow some of the abuses I have had perpetrated on me.

So here are the ways I have been abused so far . . .

1) pp’d by two players simultaneously or until my inventory was almost empty while fighting in D1-D4 then PvP killed accidentally (I’ll give him the benefit of the doubt that he wasn’t just lying, but then the Monkey guy lied to my face too).

I think we can all agree that this is just foul behavior. I personally do not like PvP pp. I don’t like be the victim of it and I do not practice it (I DO have a rogue) because I would not do unto others as I would not have done unto me. I think a three strikes and ban policy should be in place, personally. I am a professional programmer and I have done NWN scripting in years past, and I know that Sarah has been much deeper into the game routines than I have AND I believe he has access to the pp coding since the pp action must detect the presence of the Thief Stop AND I have a “note” item in my inventory that names the thief that cleaned me out and killed me after the fact. All that having been said, I believe that Sarah could do anything he wanted to regarding PvP pp, but chooses to permit it, so that’s his choice. I don’t understand the reasoning behind it because KT is NOT an RP server so there is no justifiable reason to permit it. Maybe someone wants to allow Evil alignment players to act out their fantasies, but Evil is just a game mechanic that allows certain class selection on this server. Or did I miss something about this being an RP server? Because if it is an RP server, I haven’t seen any RP going on anywhere ever. That leaves the entertainment value for someone for pp.

2) Death drop theft. Anyone that follows you around with HIPS or inviso can grab your death drop when you die, and we all die. There goes half your loot which could be substantial if it’s been a while since you shuttled your cash to a mule or went to the bank.

I don’t know the reasoning for having death drops in the first place, and I don’t particularly care for them even if they weren’t being stolen. They are more annoying than a reasonable punishment for dying and they open up a great chance for abuse as I know all too well. And then there’s problem of accidentally picking something wrong up and incurring innocent theft penalties – equally annoying, but I digress. Maybe there could be a different system whereby when you die, your loot goes to some banker from hell that you have to go negotiate a percentage return that relies on your persuade skill . . . Or maybe that 3 strikes and you’re booted things again. And you would have to plead your case for reinstatement on the forums for the public record. THAT would slow up the rampant abuse a LOT. I don’t know but that whole problem is pretty easy to fix any number of ways, if you actually wanted to. “Wanted to” being the operative words.

3) Transfer chest robbery.

I wish I had two PCs with two NWN keys so I never had to use transfer chests, but I do not. That leaves transfer chests (or the ground). I have never had a problem in years of playing with loot transfers, but I admit I have let my guard down and have finally been bitten. And I have identified the bum in the earlier post, but I doubt anything will be done about it. I don’t see an easy solution to this one even through Sarah’s incredible coding talents. I have seen Key-locked locations on other servers but that usually is coded specially and personalized with a DM granted key. I wonder if something could be arranged by NWN Key to lock the door to a hut with a chest for a fixed period of time. You could buy the lock time from a merchant. I suspect that it’s a bit of coding, though.

There are not many options for muling chests in KT. The transfer points are pretty scarce. The two in the Inn are pretty obvious and that’s where I was bitten. There is no PvP so there is absolutely nothing you can do if a player wanted to wait offline and watch for PCs with the word “mule” or something like it to show up and then log into the rooms and take your stuff. It could happen to anyone, at any time. You can even watch people log on and off in the player menu and the little log window and you'd know exactly who has what PCs and mules, and you could get them any time you wanted!

Someone told me last night that you can use those two inn chests, the charity chests (which is ASKING to get your stuff taken), and a few trees and maybe something in the sanctuary location. I think more chests scattered around might at least make a thief have to hunt around for you. I can say that I would never use those chests in the inn again because that’s where everyone spawns after a reset anyway.

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Nuli, please don’t take this the wrong way, because you might be a nice guy that works for the Peace Corp for his day job and loves small animals. And I know you are just defending a server you have probably played on for years against the flaming of a newbie. But thank you for playing the rape defense lawyer and blaming the victim. I probably am “patently stupid” to expect a good place to play. I am actually a little sorrier for you than me, though, if you think abusing other players that don’t sign up for it is okay. I just wish I had known KT had such PvP problems before I put so much time into an otherwise good server.

PS. Sooo, that rod of detection thing tells you if a player’s particular PC is ”naughty” implying that it’s ok on this server to do this kind of mean-spiritted, childish PvP crap if you have a PC for it?

There's a lot of good discussion here.

Role Playing: KT is not a role playing server per se, but RP is encouraged. I enjoy it when other players act in character. However, this doesn't override the server rules. If someone asks to be left alone, then leave them alone. Abusive things like spamming tells or party invites, following certain players around constantly, etc., are not allowed (more on this later...)

Stealing Loot: Stealing is discouraged but permitted. As noted, I permit people to choose evil characters. It's up to civilized players to destroy the evil ones. Paladins get the best gear in the game, and it's up to them to act as police. I recently reactivated the dreaded Knights Grasp spell. I will watch its use and tweak it appropriately.

Transferring Loot: I'm not really keen on the whole transferring thing in the first place. For one thing, characters who are acting in character wouldn't probably give away loot to others. For another, it makes it more difficult to keep play balance as those who have transferred the best items will be substantially better than those playing hard core, i.e., keeping only what they find. However, transferring isn't prohibited. If you transfer, you take a risk. No one says you have to use a chest or be obvious when doing so. There are literally 16 dungeons filled with less traveled locations. Even D1 has all sorts of locations available to noobs that could be used for transfer. A bit of advice: use True Seeing so you know if someone is watching the character that is dropping items.

Pick Pocket: I don't know if I'm missing something, but Pick Pocket is weak. I don't know how a player can be completely denuded of loot by pick pocket, as (unless I'm mistaken) the thief has no control over what they get. Thief Stop is easily obtained at every merchant, and the thief is doomed the instant they take one out of a player's inventory. D1 is no-PvP, so every character should have plenty of time to acquire Thief Stop by D2.

PvP: I don't recall the scripting off the top of my head, but I'm pretty certain players are perfectly safe from being murdered by higher level characters. What I mean is, a lower level character loses no loot and automatically respawns if they are murdered by someone who is more than a few levels higher. However, there's nothing to stop a high level character from repeatedly killing someone. This takes me back to abusive players...

If you see someone who is a general nuisance, simply send me their character or account names, and I'll consider banning them (I usually give a warning first). I try to catch them in the act or see if other players can act as witnesses. The Monkey character actually has three accounts from the same IP. Two different players have reported problems with him. I'm going to give him one last warning before his IP and key codes will be banned.

Caudata, I apologize for players like that who make the module miserable for others. I will act fairly to remove them.

Things I consider abusive:

Sending private tells to someone who doesn't want to talk to you.

Following a character around when the character wants to be left alone.

Stealing from the same player over and over to clean them out (if the mark is THAT easy, cleaning them out will only inspire them to leave permanently which ruins the module for everyone else--less players means less fun--and deprives the thief of future booty).

Spawning monsters and then leading them back to lower level players in order to spawn murder them.

Repeatedly sending party invites to someone who does not want to join your party.

Repeatedly murdering the same player, especially if it's clear the victim isn't an appropriate challenge.

Etc.

True the abuse has been a part of kt and back to dx when players would hunt new players and chase them out, not letting them past the woods... Then the great guild War! , and then was born kt,

Efforts to cleans the scouge has failed..