Before presenting the suggestion I first would like to highlight the current problems faced in the towns of Junktown, Vault City, Hub and recently Shady Sands; commonly referred to Guarded Towns and will be referred to just the name "town(s)" in the post. The first is the guards are NPCs who are unable to cope with the complex situations occurring day to day in guarded towns. The second is the debate of how strong guards should be to able to fend of opposing factions looking to raid cities, while at the same time leaving the option of raiding a city a possibility. In this post I will present possible solutions that can serve as a rough framework based on my experiences in FOnline and other games which have similar mechanics.
1.) Introduction of PC Guards
PC Guards are part of a centralized organization (Roleplaying is not required, but maturity is) located within the town with a Leader and multiple Co-Leaders whose functions are administrative tasks as well as guarding the town. At the start of the organization the players apply to be PC Guards using their own characters and the Leader (who also has a regular character) decides who should be eligible to join. The Leader only answers to the mayor/organizational head of the town (which can be thought of as the GM). The best way to think about the PC Guards are as a faction.
2.) Requirements to Join
Here I will only provide what I see as essential for recruits to be accepted (this can be adjusted as the Leader sees fit). The first is that the sum of their equipment tiers, which they will use while guarding adds up to 3. The second is that they have Latin names and can communicate sufficiently in English. The third is that they can provide their own gear. To give examples:
a.) A player with a Leather Jacket and a 10mm Pistol will not be eligible to join.
b.) A player with a Metal Armor and Desert Eagle will be eligible to join
c.) A player with Combat Armor and 10mm will be eligible to join.
3.) Guarding the Town
PC Guards take no reputation/karma penalties upon attacking anyone in the town where they are expected to Guard. If any player attacks the PC Guards, they are in turn attacked by NPC Guards (assuming they are still present in the town). To give examples:
a.) A player enters town who is known to be a thief, before he does any stealing he is killed by a the PC Guard who takes no penalties and the NPC Guards do not respond to the attack, other than to loot the thief.
b.) Said player comes back and punches the guard, in turn he is killed by the NPC Guards and looted.
c.) A new player who has a Cyrillic name enters the town and is killed by the PC Guard, because he doesn't like Cyrillic names, the PC Guard takes no penalties and the NPC Guards do not respond to the attack, other than to loot the player. (Solution to this situation and others will be provided in this post)
4.) Benefits for Guarding the Town
Within the administrative building of the town is a footlocker which spawns X% of Caps that occurred from transaction in trading between players and town merchants. Also the footlocker spawns equipment that would be turned to Caps by the merchants of the town, maybe even looted items by NPC Guards . Only the Leader and possibly the Co-Leaders are allowed to loot the footlocker, hence Caps and equipment are distributed as the Leader sees fit (similarly to running a faction and determining who gets what depending on how much time and effort were put in by the players).
5.) Grievances against the PC Guards
Players can submit grievances to the Leader (through methods to be determined; can be a forum post) with appropriate proof and then it is up to the Leader to determine the consequences. If many grievances are not answered the organizational head of the town (GM) intervenes. To give examples:
a.) The players with Cyrillic names who are killed by the PC Guard in 3c file grievance and the Leader investigates and decides to kick the PC Guard out.
b.) In 5a the Leader assumes that they were probably suicide bombers and decides to do nothing. The players then pester the GM (if they haven't already done so), in turn the GM creates a poll and people vote on how well the Leader is doing. If the poll shows favorable results for the Leader, the Leader stays in power, if not the Leader is demoted.
6.) Possible Problems and Solutions
Here I just will write what I think can be problems with regards to player interactions and not engine limitations.
a.) Problem: Some players constantly spam the GM that they are loosing 100k Caps because PC Guards are killing them (this can be true or untrue but this is what they say)
Solution: To prevent the GM from constantly making polls everyday to evaluate the Leader, it is limited to once every X amount of days. Also if the player feels he/she is being treated unfairly just move to a different town.
b.) Problem: PC Guards cannot be around 24/7 and the Leader has only a limited amount of time to do anything.
Solution: PC Guards are supplemented with NPC Guards, so if no PC Guards are available at certain times of day, then we are back to the current situation and nothing is lost. Hopefully Leader chose intelligent members for the PC Guards who can function effectively so he/she doesn't always have to be there.
c.) Problem: Who decides who are Leaders (one for each town)?
Solution: Possibly the GMs or the players could take a vote on it.
d.) Problem: This will create drama!
Solution: I know, but this is how you make a game interesting.
7.) Closing Thoughts
The reason why I am making this suggestion is two fold. The first is playing the "good guys" has no real benefits and is extremely boring, which I can agree on. The second is to increase the roleplay on the server, besides NCR Army which requires to play a very specific role, where as here it is just your character taking on the additional role of a guard. Also I was a bit bored.
Realistically I doubt this would be seen in the game but I just wanted to bring this out there because I have played PvP/PK games aside from FOnline that have PC Guards and it works well and is also very interesting for both the defenders and aggressors.
