Sardine - do it in the main camp and you'll be absolutely destroyed by those present. But the caravan captain in the outer camp will just ease on back and let you carry on. The seperate camp is seperate precisely 'because' of that sort of thing so it can exist. They don't attack aggressors. Its not their business until it goes into the main camp.
As for this -
Without ever testing other setups, isn't whether the MC is the "most optimal for player interactions" only a hunch?
Also, have you ever seen anyone claim the MC was the best place for high-quality RP on the server? Rather than just optimizing for number of interactions, the quality of those interactions is at least as important.
Even for PvP the RP at the MC is generally inferior because of all the factors discussed in the AMPC thread: lots of unconnected characters present, a need to strike quickly because of a lack of privacy and the potential for other PCs to arrive at any time, a flavorless setting that contributes almost nothing to the PC's potential closure story. Would anyone opt to have her PC closured at the MC versus some place more meaningful?
All that said, I think the MC is useful. Players can gather a party and have ready transportation to most of the server's dungeons. But in all honesty, this, too, leads to OOC behavior because of player desire to form strong groups that can conquer places like Sithicus. I see known evil people team up with paladins, and if you object, you get left out and are often viewed as the spoilsport.
I like having a place I can go to and signal I'm ready to dungeon. But when I'm doing something more IC, I'd like to be able to avoid such an artificial-feeling waypoint.
I can say some of my best roleplay has taken place in the Mist Camp. I didn't have the option to do it elsewhere, and it was, in truth, fantastic. The fact it is 'neutral ground' is absolutely not to be overlooked, as there is in fact extremely little such ground anywhere in the server; and sometimes, such neutral ground is required. To call or imply all of it that takes place there as bad is something of a disservice. The difference between it and the Outskirts is enormous.
As for PvP, having taken part in quite a lot of it, I can say that PvP in the MC has
never even remotely resembled the absolute debacle that is PvP in the outskirts, which is so chaotic as to be sheer noise. If we're talking about about it being a place flavorless for closures, perhaps - but frankly, choosing where you closure smacks of predetermined PvP, rather than organic.
On that note, if we had bypass areas, that were mini Vistani camps or simply guarded by local soldiers, then they would be 'dead zones' of PvP, where it'd be extremely difficult if not impossible due to NPC presence. Its already difficult enough as it is to get PvP due to the limitations of NPC oversight as having a DM is difficult (which is just limitations of having real lives and expecting constant oversight just isn't fair) which smacks of consequence avoidance to me. It's already quite difficult to pursue PvP, the Mist Camp is one of the very few places where it is quite possible to engage in it. Taking it away and avoiding it feels like weakening the danger of the setting, and the threat, and I'm personally always going to be against that.
As for paladins working with evil characters, always report that to a DM. It's something for them to make judgements upon, and their ruling will decide it.