WHY I DON'T PLAYER KILL

Though I knew about Player Kill or PK activities in Online Games, having seen it in its first inceptions in Diablo Battlenet, I have never seen it in MMORPGs as this is my first one.

As with all forms of violence, I was introduced to it in a most unexpected way, when I least expected it.

It was due to an incident where Malystryx was backstabbed during one of our forays. We were battling a flight of dragons in the skies around Fishing Village when from out of the blue, this coward struck from a distance. The damage Malystryx had sustained from the dragons made her easy to kill at that time. By the time I turned around, the coward had teleported out. We were left seething. I complained in the clan boards of the event. True enough, someone calmly replied "If you don't like player killers, you're playing the wrong game."

A major part of the game is the versus combat; from the one-on-one to the massive clan vs clan territorial wars. It is so integral that there are items that clearly are designed for PK, or to prevent being a victim of PK. There is even a switch to set your character either as willing for PK or not.

Since that event, I made it a point to always be in Safe Mode. No point in getting bothered by watching my back while trying to finish the quests which is why I was playing this game in the first place. Sad to say, we never got our revenge on the cowardly backstabber, but we don't see him around that much anymore. I guess he made the mistake of pissing off too many people. Having a few individuals hunting you down is OK in a world as big as Pangu, but when Clans put a vendetta on you, it is time to move on.

But instead of letting that incident change the way I saw the game, it further strengthened my resolve to not PK and not Duel. All players have the choice to PK or not to PK, thus the Safe Mode switch. I'm glad to see most of the higher levels have foregone PK. But when needed they dive in to defend their lesser Clan Mates when they are attacked. Which is the way it should be. With all MMORPGs, the people have to learn to police themselves.