Board Thread:Dark Souls II/@comment-16047389-20140827152737

Playing through Dark Souls 2 really makes me think they could've done more with the PvP and Covenant system in the game. So far, the three most popular Covenants seem to be Blue Sentinels, Brotherhood of Blood, and Dragon Remnants. The mechanics of dueling and invading are simple enough, but what about invasions with a bit more flair? What Covenants would you like to see/have seen in Dark Souls 2? Here's a few I've come up with:

The Grave Wardens  - The Grave Wardens are protectors of the Undead Crypt and the sleeping dead. Whenever someone lights a sconce, or worse lights the main lights in the Undead Crypt, they increase their level of disdain with the Grave Wardens, and increase the chances of being invaded by them, not unlike how the Bell Keepers invade tresspassers. However, upon being slain by a Grave Warden, all lit sconces and torches in the host's world are extinguished. The successful Grave Warden is rewarded with unique Dark items, with the Rank 3 reward potentially being a revived Gravelord Sword or Gravelord Sword Dance.

The main problem with this idea, however, is that the lighting in Dark Souls 2 doesn't become nearly as dark as it did in Dark Souls, such as the Tomb of Giants where light became almost a necessity. For this Covenant to work, the Undead Crypt would need to be similar in design.

Bounty Hunters - Ever have that one guy that just constantly invades you without remorse? The Bounty Hunters would be a great way to get your revenge. Using an item you'd get from a merchant, you'd be able to add the last person to invade you and put forth a lump of souls on their head. Bounty Hunters would then be able to invade using their own item, The Blacklist, which would prioritize invasions based on how high a person's bounty is. The higher the bounty, the higher the rate of invasion. If it is high enough, they may even be invaded by multiple Bounty Hunters at a time. But the Hunters are by no means a band of brothers. Having multiple Hunters take down a single target may be quick and efficient, but it would also split the reward between them. Bounty Hunters may either work together to take down a single target, or kill off the competition to claim the reward for themselves. Aside from the reward souls themselves, the Bounty Hunters would also recieve rewards by ranking up in the Covenant, which would be handled by the total souls they've accumulated through bounties.

This Covenant would either be very active or very slow depending on how actively the rest of the community places bounties. Although, this could also be supplemented if the game itself placed bounties on players for various reasons (perhaps they cleared an area too quick, invaded other players too frequently, overfarmed an area of souls, or other various reasons).

Order of the Mirror Squires  - An extension of the Mirror Squire mechanics, the Order of the Mirror Squires would be able to invade anyone that is in an area with an abundance of Mirrors (so far this would be Drangleic Castle and Aldia Keep). The Squire would take on an invisible/intangible form until they located a mirror, and entered it. They would then become solid, and capable of bursting out of the mirror to conduct the invasion properly. However, rather than the invasion being annoucned normally, the host would be completely unaware of the invasion until they see the Squire. There would be subtle ways of telling, of course. The host wouldn't be able to place a summon sign and the fog walls as they normally would during an invasion. Mirror Squires would also be able to wear a Ring of the Looking Glass which would allow them to be summoned by the Looking-Glass Knight from locations other than just Drangleic Castle, and without having to place a Red Summon Sign or use a Cracked Red Eye Orb. Mirror Squires would rank up through successful invasions, and be rewarded with mirror motif items. Potentially, one of these items could be an item that summons an NPC White Phantom. This could either be a static phantom with specific armor and stats, or a duplicate of the summoner themselves with good AI controls, using the same name, items, spells, and stats. Throw on a White Ring and let those Red Phantoms guess which one is the real you.

The limitations of having to use mirrors to invade would currently limit the Covenant to only invading Drangleic Castle or Aldia Keep. Of course, additional mirrors could always be added to the game. 