New Renown System for PvE and improvements of reputation gains

New Renown System for PvE and improvements of reputation gains
effort 5.0 10 quality 4.9 10 reasonability 4.7 10

Valor System – Friendly Competitive Renown

What it is: PVE Renown (friendly, competitive)
Scope: Player Level

Core Design Goals

  • Encourage positive interaction and cooperative play between various players
  • Reward a variety of playstyles (combat, exploration, trading, building, etc.)
  • Avoid turning into a leaderboard-only grind or fame/bounty clone

How to Earn Valor

Valor is earned by performing valuable and community-enhancing actions. Here are categories with example actions:

  1. Exploration Valor
  • Discovering new Dark Sea island biomes, earning high risk titles, and special lore points
  • Safely returning with Dark Sea loot or knowledge
  1. Civic Valor
  • Contributing resources or aid to another crew or guild (food, materials, money)
  • Restoring ruined structures, planting trees or flowers, and cleaning up cursed zones
  • Winning public events like fairs or fishing derbies
  1. Competitive Valor
  • Winning friendly challenges like:
    • Daily fishing contests
    • Building competitions
    • Puzzle/dungeon races
    • Treasure map completion contests
    • Boss raids (not elysium)

(A new server maybe called the competition sever would have to be added for the things above with a large map dedicated to these daily challenges, but the multitude of islands will be randomly generated with some lore and stuff in them like how the dark sea has statues and symbols)

  • Dark Sea scavenger hunts
  • PvP duels with honor rules (non-lethal, agreed-upon terms)
  • Destroying enemy NPC towers built on islands under threat (as planned in the trello)
  1. Defensive Valor
  • Repelling pirates, sea monsters, or cursed creatures from community zones
  • Escorting trade ships or protecting allied crews

Valor Decay & Consistency

(Yes I am including this because it is necessary and gives other players a chance to climb a valor leaderboard)
If you have over 120,000 valor, it will slightly decays over time by 2% of its maximum amount if you become inactive for more than 3-4 days.
However:
These methods can save up to a maximum of 30% of your total valor and and come into effect once 70% of your total valor is lost either if you have been consistently inactive, or have lost valor through another way:

  • Players can “preserve” Valor by passing down their stories via journals or statues.
  • Guilds can “bank” Valor through monuments, community-built halls, or shared vaults.
  • (I will make a thoroughly detailed suggestion on a valor preservation system later)

Positive Reinforcement Features

  • Titles & Flair: “Wayfarer of the Waves,” “Shield of Serenity,” “Skylight,” etc.
  • Public Displays: Statues and plaques on kingdom islands showing monthly valor champions

Leaderboard of Valor

The leaderboard would be divided into 4 different segments depending on the type of valor you have (also there are 4 different types you earn when shown in the bar that says + or - renown, but all equal into one general stat called valor which is shown when you hover over a player’s info).

The highest earner in the defensive valor will have a title called “Serene Shield”
The highest earner in the competitive valor will have a title called “Harmonic Harbinger”
the highest earner in explorative valor will have a title called “Intuitive Wayfinder”
etc. etc.

Social Element: “Tales of Valor”

Each hour, the server may spotlight a few player or guild achievements in a story-style feed on the agora:

“The crew of the Indigo Tide escorted two new players safely through a Dark Sea storm earning them 250 Valor and the title ‘Storm Shepherds’.”

Light Competitive Seasoning

  • Monthly “Valor Cycles” can have themed challenges (ocean cleanup, lighthouse defense, lost treasure race)
  • Top guilds earn medals instead of domination and purely aesthetic bragging rights
  • Friendly rivalry is encouraged through in-game banter features, not through overwriting others’ progress

HOWEVER, for people who wish to be villainous, here is something for you:

Dread System The Villainous Renown Counterpart to Valor

What is Dread?

Dread is a reputation system for players and guilds with negative PvE renown, who engage in sinister, chaotic, or selfish behavior not by killing other players, but by disrupting the environment, manipulating NPC factions, and turning the world toward entropy.

It’s morally ambiguous roleplay with gameplay weight, aimed at:

  • Villains
  • Anti-heroes
  • Rogue guilds
  • Dark explorers, etc.

Core Design Goals

  • Encourage immersive villain/rogue playstyles without griefing
  • Create a parallel progression path for players who enjoy subversion, sabotage, and dark world-building
  • Make villainy feel meaningful, stylish, and rich with consequences
  • Still support non-lethal, non-toxic, and community-inclusive PvPvE behavior

How to Earn Dread

Instead of contributing to society, Dread is earned by disturbing it, twisting it, or bending it to your will. Think corruption, manipulation, sabotage, forbidden knowledge, and dark rituals.

  1. Ruinous Exploration (Exploration Dread)
  • Discover and awaken cursed ruins, forbidden temples, or sealed monsters (who knows, ormolu, goliath, or the omen :winking_face_with_tongue:)
  • Complete Dark Sea corruption rituals (summon small storms and alter biomes every hour)
  • Interact with ancient cursed artifacts that taint surroundings
  • Return from the dark sea with

Title Example: “Abysswalker”
Highest Earner Title: “Depthmonger”

  1. Sinister Civic Acts (Civic Dread)
  • Poison NPC farm crops or curse nature zones (corrupt trees, infect waters)
  • Bribe NPCs and commanders to lower kingdom island guard presence or that kingdoms ship spawning rates in your server
  • Commit vile actions in towns like stealing, vandalization, and killing multiple citizens (this would put the town under threat and call either the grand navy or the kingdoms more powerful guards, but it wouldn’t be an endless wave like in WoM),
  • Summon cursed fog via dark weather

Title Example: “Foghand”
Highest Earner Title: “Veil Architect”

  1. Dread Arena (Competitive Dread)
  • Participate in opt-in cursed dueling events in specific zones (arena islands or fog-claimed battlegrounds)
  • All duels are non-lethal and only between Dread-marked players
  • Spectators can bet cursed coins or back champions

(Also the competitions from the valor side are for everyone and you earn either dread or valor depending on your renown stat when you win one, so that is part of competitive dread)

Title Example: “Icon of Infamy”
Highest Earner Title: “The Veiled Victor”

  1. Dark Dominion (Defensive Dread)
  • Subvert towns via influence rituals (NPCs start obeying or fearing you)
  • Convert cursed towers into beacons of dread
  • Repel valor players and valor NPCs from cursed sites unless they dispell using a certain mechanic

Title Example: “Ward of Shadows”
Highest Earner Title: “Twilight Bastion”

Dread Decay & Legacy

Like Valor, Dread will decay slowly after inactivity (~2% every 3–4 days above 120,000). But it too can be preserved through:

  • Writs of Blight (dark versions of journals) stored in cursed tomes
  • Effigies or monuments of fear crafted by guilds
  • Unsealed Relics placed in deep zones to whisper the Dread-wielder’s name

Once a player loses 70% of their total Dread, their dark legacy kicks in, restoring 30% via the preserved record.

Positive Reinforcement for Dread

  • Unique Flair & Visuals: Characters with high Dread may appear shadowy, leave trails of cursed mist, or have glowing eyes (cosmetic only)
  • Special Gear Unlocks: Access to cursed versions of gear, haunted mounts, corrupted ship sails
  • Lore-Based Interactions: Only Dread characters can see or unlock certain cursed ruins, rituals, or NPCs

“Whispers of Dread” Social Element

Every hour, a dark update might appear on the Agora:

“The guild Wyrmrest Pact defiled the lighthouse of Obsidian Reach. Fog now coils around the harbor, and civilians speak of vanished traders…”

Seasonal “Cycles of Dread”

Just like Valor’s random events, Dread has Dark Cycles, with themed goals:

  • “The Eclipse Tide” – Corrupt the greatest number of beacons
  • “Blight Bloom” – Spread nature corruption across 10 islands
  • “The Silent Signal” – Sabotage all communication towers before dawn

Top guilds earn cursed medals and non-mechanical bragging rights.

Random but I think this should be a thing:

  • Weather Buffs: Minor environment bonuses (faster travel, increased mystic fish spawn rate, etc.)
    Kind of like the planned meteor weather, what if when you crack open a rare one you get unique weather exclusive armor?
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Also you may ask why is this necessary, well its because of the server divide, renown as it is, is based off of player vs player combat and grindy leaderboard centered progress, and is not at all meant for PvE players, this is a new system for PvE players like you and me to have that would be catered to us and our needs without implementing unnecessary player combat. (This also makes it so that you aren’t automatically having your toggle disabled just because you were too ambitious with your renown and went above 300k)

whatever, go my triple 5 stars!

1 Like

Added one for villains

incredibly well made suggestion I would love if we could get an alternative to renown for pve mains quick question would this display alongside renown if you have any also I think it would be cool if this affected factions like the gravy and asyn so we could have like PvE admirals/overseers and PvP ones

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No, your bounty/fame stays in pvp servers, and your valor/dread stays in pve servers because it wouldn’t make sense for them to display in a server that doesnt have anything to do with them, and I believe the gravy and asyn would require valor or dread, and their ranks would be displayed on the new PvE leaderboard.

i think this could just fit to the current reputation system because we already have pve things like hunting npc’s, that is already a pve thing that gains you reputation and vetex is already planning to add stuff for no pvp players who grind reputation, so… making another renown system isnt necessary

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instead of changing the whole system these could instead be new ways to earn reputation/bounty, very cool!

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Peak, please, this sounds fun as hell and I love the ability to be heroic or villainous without having to fight other people. These more subtle methods feel a lot more impactful on the greater world. Really hope Vetex takes notice of this suggestion.

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Why not just do it anyway? Nobody wants to spend 24/7 killing NPCs and there isnt really much of another way a renown system in PvE could even work, Its a good system and only benefits you the player due tothe fun and mischief you can have with it. Its not necessary to make suggestions because most aren’t needed, but they are nice features to be added that everyone would enjoy. And plus, this is a renown system, not an infamy one and not every PvE player wants to have to be in a guild to win rewards for doing these activities.

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I like it, but it seems too much to add onto the game rn too heavy a feature yk

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This is such a good suggestion and I hope someone can pass it on to Vetex since I love it

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Have some triple 5

As a primarily PvE player, I would love this. Hopefully it will get noticed, PvE players should have more competitive activities.

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you need to take vetex’s time as a factor too because the one who is making the game is him :broken_heart:

that is what i meant, vetex has planned things for people who want to pve with pvp off, your suggestion can work without making another complicated renown system

its funny because that technically turns pve into pvp cus.. you are competing with other players and pvp means player vs player and.. and you know

i don’t really get it, guilds exist. why do we need to cater to the extremely niche subset of players who share the conflicting traits

  • competitive
  • refuses to be in guilds
  • only does pve
  • sort of a roleplayer
  • despite allat, absolutely wants to be on a leaderboard

a lot of these also seem to make much more sense for pure roleplay purposes without necessarily being good or interesting gameplay mechanics, like the methods to maintain valor and dread or a few methods to gain those or a few weirder methods to gain it (restoring monuments? doing rituals? escorting? none of these are mechanics to begin with.)

i commend the effort put into this though. i think it would be extremely cool for perhaps a somewhat different kind of game with a lot more emphasis on roleplay. AO isn’t really a roleplay game whatsoever but then again that’s just my opinion

Guilds exist… and you can just gain reputation from doing these things too if you are within a guild.

Competitive doesn’t quite conflict with anything else, and if it conflicts with the core of PvE, then how so if the competitions are purely based off of PvE mechanics? As said before… these aren’t locked to anyone, anyone can do this stuff, if you are in a guild, you earn valor/dread and reputation, if you are not in a guild you just earn the renown.

Already said its not locked to anyone, and saving castaways, stopping criminals, completing quests and helping townspeople, and then the planned enemy tower mechanic, can all be considered roleplay… you restore a randomly generated ruin with a repair hammer and earn valor, you do rituals like the dragon blood ritual which would earn you dread, and escorting trade ships is basically the same thing as escorting castaways but on a bigger scale and with more renown.

And finally, the leaderboard is simply an extra feature that gives you titles and bragging rights and nothing else, just like the one you have now.

This system atp this system is both a new renown and reputation gain system. Hell just renown but renamed and with a bunch of new juicy methods of gaining it. You dont even HAVE to add the new names vetex, you can take as long as you want to develop it, but if you consider this and release it well most people here will be satisfied.

Vetex can take as long as he wants and develop this whenever he wants, I just want this suggestion to get big enough to where eventually a tester, or a moderator, or someone who can recommend it to vetex for its notes, or even vetex himself can see it and possibly add most of this.

Vetex’s time is an important factor ngl and he should do what he wants to at the pace he wants, but I feel this feature could be worth being added to the list he’s chewing through, especially given the very positive response from most people.

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Spectacular work!

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