The "chaotic" notion that Wolfsong mentioned is close to my line of thinking on this subject. You can use a flagging system to restrict a player's freedom of movement and access to shared resources and services. When an act of aggression is performed, it is judged on a few criteria. Did the victim fight back? What was the disparity in power between the aggressor and the aggrieved? Where did the event take place? Were there any witnesses who survived? Accomplices? Depending on the enormity of the crime, the offender is penalized. Here are a few examples of penalties that can be mixed and matched depending on how you want to balance out your system:

Personal Aggression Flag: The target of an act has the option to violently engage the act's perpetrator without facing the normal penalties.
Global Aggression Flag: Any player can engage the flagged individual freely.
Criminal Flag: NPC law enforcement will attack the criminal on sight.
Embargo Flag: NPC merchants or service providers will not deal with the flagged individual.

A little imagination could surely expand the list. The idea is that the flags become a sort of meta-game. After all, the Personal Aggression Flag is basically a duel invitation. It might be delivered via a "You want to duel?" button, or it might happen as a consequence of a clumsy pocket-pick or a cargo scan or an area-of-effect attack's collateral damage Maybe I intentionally aggro a tough-looking dude so he'll hit me back, and once he's aggro'd on me I have my team swoop in and heal me while I chip away at him and call him names in chat. A global flag could last for a period of time or it could be cut short by fulfilling a requirement, like paying a fine at a police station or surrendering to a player, who then gets credit for the arrest.

I think the best way to pull this off is to have it faction-orientated. People protect each other in their little settlements, forts, stations etc and have the choice of venturing outside and potentially be hunted or ambushed. This also encourages co-operation of players.

Limit the amount of carrying items and then full loot doesn't sound too bad.

Is it really such a big problem to resolve this? I can see at least 5 non-artificial and 1 semi artificial rules for the realm to significantly suppress "the feast".

Here comes the semi-artificial:
If the weaker player is forced to encounter much stronger player character then based on some ratio of level, dmg etc. there would be a switch that will turn the weaker player's damage to stack in to wolf's limbs, and as the limbs can care only particle of the wolfs total life pool it will be feasible to score limb cut-off for the underdog character.There can be also some additional conditions for it like the damage stacks only when scored from the same side and/or to same height.
For recovering there would be needed to have some special herbs for preseving the part and to make some purifying quest for the temple for heal.

When the contrast beween characters will be too big the underdog can get a chance to cut off at least a finger or to make a scar. (and as it can hold only small particle of total life it will be feasible) So now there would be a motivation to fight for the sheeps, and the wolf can get hunted (which is the best teaching for him) as might weaken.

Why do I call it semi-artificial rule? Try to spar with newbies in real life

Every full loot game that I've enjoyed, actually ended up being "more than full loot". Basically perfectly safe holdings like "banks" just don't exsist. If you wished to strike back at someone sure you could kill them, but you could just as easily go for their holdings(storage) and loot that. Such mechanics force all PvPers to participate in the community, meaning they are beholden and must actually calculate the social returns of their actions. Games that follow this system(wurmOnline/Haven and Hearth) actually maintained a vast majority of their community as sheep, despite having a much harder rulesets than most other PvPer games.

Ideally, if sheeps aren't careful, then wolves could kill them and the wolves would get more stuff than the sheep. However, if the sheep are careful, then they don't get killed and get all the stuff.

The problem you have is the best way for the sheep to be careful is to not play this game.

The point the original poster misses is that its really, really hard to convince someone else to pay to be your victim.

[quote name='aattss' timestamp='1345942946' post='4973378']
Ideally, if sheeps aren't careful, then wolves could kill them and the wolves would get more stuff than the sheep. However, if the sheep are careful, then they don't get killed and get all the stuff.

The problem you have is the best way for the sheep to be careful is to not play this game.

The point the original poster misses is that its really, really hard to convince someone else to pay to be your victim.
[/quote]

If the sheep doesn't play the game, he doesn't get a benefit. It isn't just migitating risk, it's increasing the profit to risk ratio. Also, there is more to this game than sheep-and-wolf.

Also, we're supposed to be brainstorming ways to make this work, not saying it won't work. At minimum, you should describe why it won't work, and listen to people as they take your advice and see if they can use it to come up with a solution.

Also, we're supposed to be brainstorming ways to make this work, not saying it won't work. At minimum, you should describe why it won't work, and listen to people as they take your advice and see if they can use it to come up with a solution.

Read the thread. Theres a number of solutions, which can collectively be summed up as

'Make the life of a wolf very, very hard'.

However, when you do that wannabe wolves whine that their preferred playstyle of making other paying customers victims isnt being respected.

Wannabe wolves want all the reward, and none of the risk. They want all the benefits of being a sheep when they feel like that, and to be able to put on wolves clothing when they feel like that (note the popularity of "PvE alts" to fund PvP).

So, you either make everyone a wolf - World of Tanks - or you make being a victim voluntary - PvP flags/zones.

Either solution doesnt give wannabe wolves their stream of victims, so they come to threads like this and whine.

Just to make it really, really clear, the OP said what he wanted

"PKs (wolfs) need sheep (miners, PvMers etc) to kill.. It's what they enjoy."

In that case, I'd suggest the best solution is for the PKs to be contributing around, say, $10 an hour to each of the PvMers, so the PvMers can be compensated for not doing what they like, which is PvM, so the PKers can do what they like.

At minimum, you should describe why it won't work, and listen to people as they take your advice and see if they can use it to come up with a solution.

No solution will work when your 'wolves' are the same people who will abuse log outs and alternate accounts to avoid any consequences for their actions.

There are more than just Wolves, and Sheeps. Don't forget Hyenas, Zergs, Lions, and many more
Lions are Pvpers who enjoy defeating other Lions, and usually will let Sheeps get away. Hyena will mostly aim for Sheeps, might aim for a Lion if they are pushed for it. Zergs usually aim for ... well, anything. Wolves might aim for Sheeps and Lions, but will usually leave Hyenas and Zergs alone.

Now, if you want to attract more Sheeps, you need more than just Open PvP. You need PvE. You also need to give methods for Sheeps to turn into Zergs if they want to as well.