I have been avoiding playing evil characters or playing characters with slight chance of being assasinated because of corpse hiding,I did look for people's corpses and it was really really unfun with possibility of lack of any ic clues and the murderers can just move the corpses when they are in different timezone
One of the things i would like to be added is addition of some way of branding people that are carrying corpses(maybe smell?) this increases the risk of relocation of corpses.
also maybe give someway for spirits to be able to track their corpse over a long time(a month or so ?) so if the spot hasnt changed so it could be found so maybe the player that is dead can see if the corpse hider is breaking rules .
If you have
any inclination to believe that your corpse is in a spot that is violating the rules (or, indeed, the corpse of someone you know is in such a spot), then you should contact a DM. They have the capability to easily identify such things and will take steps immediately to resolve it. The results of their labor will most likely not be made known to you - but they will look, and unless we're accusing DMs of being a secret cabal bent against certain players, they will make sure things are above board.
As long as corpse-hiding is legal, the ability to track down your corpse would without doubt result in tells sent and people suddenly "coincidentally" finding bodies.
As a more general address to the topic at hand, I won't pretend that corpse-hiding is a perfect solution. I also won't pretend that the negative experiences people have shared or implied are invalid. However, I do think that some people want a system where they
always have the option to say "Time out! PvP is one of my red lights!" and frankly that's as damaging to a shared narrative as people getting punked and dumped for thin reasoning (whichyoucanreporttoaDM).
This issue is a part of the nature of being a large-scale shared narrative. Smaller communities can get away without systems like this because
all of the players are reasonably able to be in touch with each other at all times, and those small communities typically have a very concrete shared mindset. I've seen enclaves on large, relatively consequence-free servers that emulate this as a necessity, while the rest of said server generally continues either in rather light storylines (because consequence is 100% at player whim) or what I call the "feedback loop of conflict", best described by Chumbawumba's 1997 hit
Tubthumping.
"I get knocked down, but I get up again
You are never gonna keep me down"
For us, there need to be tools to provide an actual cessation/delay of conflict, to prevent the feedback loop. Some large communities do this via a "New Life Rule", whereby you can't simply stand up after getting knocked down and go to your local garda/newspaper/do-gooder and say "Here is my 20/20 description of the people who killed me and the dark secrets that I uncovered that I was killed for knowing" - some do it by having a system where after a certain number of deaths, you're just
dead, incentivizing de-escalation. PotM's death system is how we handle it. And it could be better! As EO says, he's working on some changes.
FinalHeaven actually raised a relevant point, in that I believe there might be some misconception of what qualifies as "opting in" to conflict. Opting-in is not sending a tell to a faction leader saying that they can kill you, it is willingly having your character engage in behaviors that lead to conflict. Striving openly against the tyranny of the garda or gathering/spilling the secrets of a guild of rogues and assassins would be good examples that might warrant being hidden for a while, or indefinitely if you decided to act against these powerful institutions without allies. If these sorts of things didn't count as opting-in, it would be unfair to those your character acts against, as it would render them powerless to react.
Without some means to ensure de-escalation, or to cease/delay conflict, stories very quickly become slug-fests that don't make much sense and take on a tinge of absurdity. Characters trend towards open disregard of persons and groups that should warrant a degree of care in dealing with and death cheapens (and it's not exactly expensive right now). Risk creates good stories - it's why people like Game of Thrones, Martin manages to make his characters
feel like they don't have plot-armor, even if it's not true.
I'll leave off with some advice for those afraid of stealthers. If you've done things that cause you worry that people might be skulking in the shadows looking for you, invest in detection. As high as stealthers can get their scores, you can get yours (especially listen) and for cheaper (especially listen). Keep moving - stealth is
slow, don't stand still for them in a public place. Keep your meetings in private places - lock, ward, trap the entrances. Actually consider what you would do if you were being
hunted - would you carry on with life as normal, and then be shocked when you were found?
This ended up being a lot more than I intended to type, so I'll
actually leave off with a brief tl;dr.
- Report it to the DM if you suspect a body has been hidden in an illegal location, your's or others'
- Risk creates good stories - look at Game of Thrones
- Some system for de-escalation, cessation, or delay of conflict needs to exist to give stories meaning
- Opting-in to conflict can be done in more ways than you might think
- If you're being hunted, act like it
- Be excellent to one another