Note  59  Melkor       (08/20/09 20:29)  The Blessing of Mandos

Greetings Ardans,
 
Since the inception of the game, there have been issues related
to player-killing and harassment.  Throughout the years we have
made great strides in attempting to stave off harassment through
"level-bashing," "double-taps," and "gang-bangs."  We have had
numerous discussions, petitions, and surveys about having some
manner of PK flag and we have always rejected them.  We have
long maintained an effort to maintain a balance between allowing
players to settle disagreements and provocations with blood and
preventing players from ruining other players' enjoyment of the
game.  After a very long time, we believe that we have found a
way to maintain that balance while extricating the administration
from Player-vs-Player squabbles.
 
Today we unveil a new form of protection against potentially 
harassing player-killing: The Blessing of Mandos.
 
The Blessing of Mandos is akin to a forced "merciful" attack in that
the victim will not die (and no murder charge will be levied), but
will drop all gold and equipment.  The victim will flee to their
home-town location and be unattackable for a brief duration in the 
same manner as mercifully-defeated opponents.  The victim will also 
be commbanned from the OOC comm for 30 minutes.
 
The Blessing of Mandos will occur under the following conditions:
 
  I) The victim has less than 0 hit-points, AND
 
 II) The victim has not committed any lawsys crimes in the past 5 days.
     This includes ALL lawsys crimes: false report, attempted theft,
     theft, attempted murder, murder, and contract kill, AND
 
III) The victim dies at the hands of a player (NPC death does not 
     apply), AND
 
 IV) One or more of the following three conditions:
 
  a) The victim's last PK-caused death was less than 5 minutes 
     prior, OR
 
  b) The victim has been killed 5 times in the last 5 days (not 
     counting the impending death), OR
 
  c) The victim is below level 10 and the killer is above level 14.
 
EXCLUSIONS:
The Blessing of Mandos will never occur if the killer is in 
possession of a contract for the victim's death.
 
In addition to the creation of the Blessing of Mandos, please note 
that for all player-caused deaths, a commban from the OOC comm for 
15 minutes will be in effect.  This will effectively allow you to 
silence your provokers for a short period of time.
 
As the Blessing of Mandos effectively prevents players from being 
level-bashed into obscurity, Valinor will no longer hear law reports 
of this sort of crime.
 
We hope that these changes will eliminate much of the suffering of
lost gold, experience, and time that has been reported to us over these
many, many years.  We look forward to your feedback.
 
Thank you for continuing to make us a great place to be,
 
The administration of The Two Towers.