Board Thread:Suggestions forum/@comment-26172435-20170325082258

Basic notion & motive
As I 'witnessed' quite a number of occassions where players get easy alignment from killing numerous low tier NPCs of their enemies in enemy lands, I pondered there appears to be a still existing fundamental flaw in the 'invasion' mechanics that simply may have been overlooked for quite some time.

Examples:
 * It makes no sense that Dale invades the Rhúdel, while there are no defensive raids when an enemy player or force enters Dale and starts killing off its populace. Same holds for many other faction lands where civilians roam.
 * It makes no sense that Vintner Guards launch an attack on the accidental thief that hits a grapevine, while the home military forces of Dorwinion remain conspicuous by their absence when a Mordor aligned player comes slaughtering the locals gathered in the open field near a bathhouse, wine cellar or garden.

Proposal
Now, apparently the mechanic is already recognised and implemented, as the Hobbit Shirriffs are able to launch defensive raids in their lands. So, my proposal is simple: make defensive raids of native forces spawn with some tbd chance of occurence whenever civilians or home miltary units are being attacked by an enemy force. That could be either a player with low enough alignment (say -100 or lower), or a player with a number of hired units.

Feature mechanics and related proposals
The feature mechanic would be very much similar to the earlier proposed counter-invasions (see links below), but I figure the motive for a defensive raid is different and this may justify a different composition of the responding force. So, both trigger and resulting action will be specific. A counter-invasion will be triggered based on an invasion of an enemy NPC force, while a defensive raid is triggered by either the murderous presence of players and/or hired NPCs. The more hired NPCs accompanying a player, the higher the chances a defensive raid will spawn, and the stronger the responsive force should be. As the Hobbit Shirriffs are already enabled to perform defensive raids, I figure it shouldn't be a daunting task to implement them for more factions.

Endorsed threads with relevant related proposals:


 * Counter-invasions, patrols, foragers and raiders : Check the proposal on patrols!
 * Battles that spawn like invasions.

Urgency for gameplay balance
The urgency of this improvement is quite high as far as I'm concerned, as it contributes to balancing the chances of players ability to acquire aligment in enemy lands, especially with the upcoming feature 'spheres of influence'.

Combination with spheres of influence
When combined with the introduction of that feature you could even consider to have defensive raids spawn within a 'sphere of influence' rather than just a factions home biome. As I indicated on the mods Facebook page, I believe it may be worthwhile to consider biome-dependent spheres of influence, either instead of or in addition to the geonometrical spheres. The mechanic of defensive raids could be combined with any option imo. 