Fixing and balancing theft/tracking.

[Hamel]

Anyone should be able to track any clues. Otherwise, people could steal from someone who won't be on for awhile, and will be completely safe from retribution, because the other members of the village the victim belongs to would not be able to help. Besides, how would it work for village claims? Clue scent counts should be on a person by person basis, instead.

While I agree that there should be alternatives to killing the criminals, when it comes to theft, the option to kill them should remain until there are other ways to punish them.

[Ferinex]

Otherwise, people could steal from someone who won't be on for awhile, and will be completely safe from retribution, because the other members of the village the victim belongs to would not be able to help.

Unless kin can also gather them, and the property is kinned Besides, it's not really 'retribution' when someone totally unrelated to the matter is killing the thief :3 Edit: The previous sentence was an opinion.

Besides, how would it work for village claims?

Village members? Or lawspeaker/chieftain/hirdsmen.

[Hamel]

Otherwise, people could steal from someone who won't be on for awhile, and will be completely safe from retribution, because the other members of the village the victim belongs to would not be able to help.

Unless kin can also gather them, and the property is kinned Besides, it's not really 'retribution' when someone totally unrelated to the matter is killing the thief :3

I, as Chieftain of Bottleneck, feel obligated to retribute those who steal from, or otherwise harm, the citizenry of the our town. It's called public protection, silly.

Edit: Also, I'd prefer limitation of freedom be done by the players, not the game mechanics. If some random wants to run around killing those who commit "crimes", I say let em. (Not advocating such actions.)

Besides, how would it work for village claims?

Village members? Or lawspeaker/chieftain/hirdsmen.

Too many village members, the clues would quickly run out of scents gathered by people with low exploration, especially since the scent count would be based on what the exploration of the personage who saw it, was. The Lawspeaker/Chieftain/Hirdsmen are not on all the time, and sometimes clues need to be followed quickly. Like, when trying to return stolen items before they get fenced.

All in all, I like my idea better.

[Ferinex]

Super, but your idea has the same exact problems mine has, with the added ability of a thief to gather his own clues from a village claim until there are no more left for trackers to lift.

Oh, and read my edit.

[Hamel]

Super, but your idea has the same exact problems mine has, with the added ability of a thief to gather his own clues from a village claim until there are no more left for trackers to lift.

Apparently you do not understand my suggestion. I suggested that the scent count be different for each player. If someone sucked up all of the clues scents for themself, everyone else who sees it still has their number to empty.

[Delamore]

Super, but your idea has the same exact problems mine has, with the added ability of a thief to gather his own clues from a village claim until there are no more left for trackers to lift.

Apparently you do not understand my suggestion. I suggested that the scent count be different for each player. If someone sucked up all of the clues scents for themself, everyone else who sees it still has their number to empty.

So now instead of 1-2 rangers running around getting all clues we have 4-6 so they can get tons of clues and not possibly find the criminal?

[Hamel]

Apparently you do not understand my suggestion. I suggested that the scent count be different for each player. If someone sucked up all of the clues scents for themself, everyone else who sees it still has their number to empty.

So now instead of 1-2 rangers running around getting all clues we have 4-6 so they can get tons of clues and not possibly find the criminal?

Um, could you clarify your post? I have absolutely no idea what you're trying to say.

[Delamore]

Apparently you do not understand my suggestion. I suggested that the scent count be different for each player. If someone sucked up all of the clues scents for themself, everyone else who sees it still has their number to empty.

So now instead of 1-2 rangers running around getting all clues we have 4-6 so they can get tons of clues and not possibly find the criminal?

Um, could you clarify your post? I have absolutely no idea what you're trying to say.

I'm saying that a system that allowed each person to get their own pool would result in bunches of rangers running around being able to pin point anyone much like now due to having stupidly high amounts of clues between them.

[Hamel]

So now instead of 1-2 rangers running around getting all clues we have 4-6 so they can get tons of clues and not possibly find the criminal?

Um, could you clarify your post? I have absolutely no idea what you're trying to say.

I'm saying that a system that allowed each person to get their own pool would result in bunches of rangers running around being able to pin point anyone much like now due to having stupidly high amounts of clues between them.

Nope. They wouldn't have stupidly high amounts of clues, because the clues would fade, and the scent count would be based on exploration. And other ideas presented by the OP make pin pointing criminals based on exploration.

[theTrav]

Many good ideas in this post.

I like the idea of an inheritance / theft belief slider, that could then be used to combat alt exploits (not perfect but would make it more painful for the AltVaulters)
If someone logged out with a stolen item that they didn't steel themselves, could they be summoned/tracked/retrieved?

If someone steels a raw material and uses it to make a manufactured good, then does the thief tag transfer to the new good?

I think the idea of each person only being able to get a limited number of uses out of a crime scene is a good one. It could be harder for them in other ways as well:
1 - Fix stenches so they decay in inventories.
2 - Don't allow transferring stenches between containers (if you drop it it's gone forever)
3 - Only allow characters to carry one stench from each crime scene at a time (I believe this is already implemented)
4 - Start the decay timer as soon as the ranger has retrieved their first stench from the crime scene. Once that decay timer is up, that ranger cannot retrieve any more stenches from that scene.