rjshae

They could create an "Attire" reputation, with the two extremes being armored or casual. Depending on which one you are wearing, you change your faction rating. This would then get a different reaction from certain individuals. Potentially there could be shades of grey--light armor would lie closer to the casual faction than would field plate, for example. Or there could be a more general "Violent nature" reputation, with your current armor and armaments shifting your faction somewhat.

Well the easy answer is: this is a fantasy setting so the purpose was unique. But, in trying to rationalize it, perhaps the original reason for constructing the walls no longer exists and the interior buildings were added later, then abandoned? It would be intriguing to find some almost completely ruined structures inside the curtain wall, implying a violent past when the stronghold was invested, captured, and the interior structures razed.

No, you have a level's worth of wiggle room. There's no need for a hard-coded cap if you keep the maximum possible total below the amount for the next level.

Nah, there is no such a thing as Chaos. Chaos is just a fancy, eerie word for Order that is beyond our comperhension, so we say Chaos Perhaps a Yin/Yang godlike representing both sides of the coin?

I feel sympathetic and not a little fearful for the protesters. I hope it all works out for the best, but I fear it won't. More often than not, revolutions lead to conditions and governments that are far worse than the state it replaced.

Since there is no XP for culling respawns, the amount of XP it is possible to gain may be absolutely fixed. This may mean that there is no level cap necessary since you could never reach the next level anyway (short of using cheat codes).

Careful, that could lead to Kraken god-likes... or worse...

... I see what you did there. "Hide" check... 'Cause his skin is conspicuously bright red! HAH! Yes indeed, the red coloration would be a dead giveaway.

It's possible the paper doll panels in the inventory screen may show more detail, although they haven't shown us that yet. But given the amount of detail shown in the update #72 rendered cat form, we may get to see a decent sized representation of our characters.

To me a so-called "good troll" would presumably lie in a grey area of interpretation, so it is unclear if there definitely are such entities.

Too true. Our minds are hardwired to take certain judgment shortcuts for survival purposes; racism and bigotry is likely one of the unfortunate results.

*sudden idea for a PoE monster* Huge, bright-red troll that likes to try and hide behind small, green bushes before jumping out and saying "boo." Hide check... failed.

So you think there is never a good troll and if there is, it's called something else and not a troll? Is it so hard to accept that there could be good trolls (whether it's a person or post). No, that is not what I said.

A crpg that can simulate a good PnP rpg experience would require a level of AI development that we haven't managed yet. Once we do that though, it's probably game over anyway....

Not really. (Also, the 98% number is a figure I pulled out of my ass, figuratively speaking. Suffice to say 'vast majority') As Zor stated, they serve a purpose. The problem is that of the "bad trolls", I would guess that almost every single one of them thinks they are a "good troll". It takes sharp with and a good grasp of subtlety be a "good troll". A lot of people think of themselves as being witty and subtle, very few actually are. I'm not even sure that what is being classified as a "good troll" is actually a troll. More like the Socratic method being applied by a closet prankster.

But where's a bird of prey when you really need one? http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=JUHci4JxwC4

From a game design perspective, the +/- abilities modifiers only really make sense for min-maxing in a system where the ability assignment is non-linear; whether by gaussian-distributed dice rolls or through an escalating point cost. Once it becomes a flat growth curve, the modifiers have little or no benefit. I prefer a system where the racial types are distinguished by career paths that are not readily available to other races, such as through prerequisites on selectable talents or spells. Plus limited-use special abilities, of course, such as low-light vision. The +/- modifiers could be applied to preferred/disfavored skill caps, I suppose.

If this is a newly colonized region then I'm not sure that land ownership will be as significant an issue as it would in the old world. After all, cheap land was one of the selling points for drawing in the original colonists to the new world. A more significant issue might be indentured servitude: paying off a debt as a bonded laborer for some period of time. That and outright slavery. The wealthy class are more likely to own the labor that works the fields.

Kerfluffles the gelatinous cube companion could be the pet of an Orlan sewer ranger. Not sure it could keep up real well though...

Totally agree on both accounts. It wouldn't surprised me if the research is a knee-jerk reaction to the media stories over the last few years of internet trolling. The research (and I use that term loosely) seems to paint all trolls with a sweeping generalisation of psychopathic narcissistic sadists. And as Meshugger points out, you can have trolls that do it for the fun and giggles without actually hurting anyone or do it to get people thinking out of their own closed world views. This reads like a straw-man argument that applies the same set of sweeping generalizations and inherent bias in which the scholars are accused of engaging. The linked article is an editorial about the peer-reviewed paper, so you can expect some amount of personal opinion to be expressed there. Hopefully, the paper will spark some follow-on studies.

This isn't a troll attempt, but is a link to an interesting psychology article: "Internet Trolls Really are Horrible People" The following personality traits have apparently been confirmed by a psychological study: machiavellianism, narcissim, psychopathy, and sadism. Ouch!