You've been grinding in a solo rotation for about an hour, about to pop a new loot scroll and new elixers / buffs.  Peacefully minding your own business, not bothering a soul, and in comes a guildless intruder.  Instead of asking you how long you'll be, or asking for a Duel for Spot, or even without straight up attacking your charcater, they just start hitting the mobs in the rotation you're about to get to.  Keep in mind, this is a solo grind spot rotation.

You may think to yourself, "Hey, maybe they're new, maybe they don't know the rotation layouts specified by the community".  So you approach them and kindly type, "Hey!  I'm grinding this rotation, mind if I let you know when I'm done?" -- but to your dismay, it's like you don't exist.  They ignore you, completely.  "Hmm", you think to yourself, "maybe they didn't see me, let me try again so they can clearly see my chat box".  You try communicating respectfully again, "Hey :D sorry, I got this spot, I've been here for an hour, I'll LYK when I'm done!".  No response.  With frustration naturally (and unsurprisingly) rising, you ask them, "How about we just DFS?".  Nope.  Nothing.  You, the person who was there first, simply do not exist or matter to this person.  You're left with no options here - every option causes you to lose something.  PK them?  Lose Karma. They'll keep coming back, trust me.  Leave spot?  You give in to bullying.  And the next spot/channel you swap to might be occupied.  Share the spot?  You lose EXP, income and rare drop rates.  You literally cannot do anything about this without losing out on something.  You can try feeding them to mobs, but mob-feeding is not guaranteed and takes a bit of practice to know how to do it -- it's not an intended mechanic either, to feed others to mobs.  They're removing mob-feeding soon, as evidence.

This is a problem that I encountered this past weekend.  And this is a problem that's plagued the grinding scene for a long time.  This is a blatant, toxic act, shunned by the large part of the community.  But it happens.  And it sucks because players are crippled by it with no option granted by the game to del with this situation.

Players are not incentivised to use the combat strength they have earned if the Karma System is set up this way.  If you PK the intruder, you will lose Karma for it while the intruder loses absolutely nothing (an elixer, or minutes off a scroll is 'nothing' compared to the gameplay cripling effects of being red).  There simply is no option players can take to protect themselves from this toxic act, if you PvP them, you lose Karma because they'll keep coming back (since they lose nothing), if you swap rotations or leave the spot, you give in to being "bullied".  Damned if you do, damned if you don't, basically, and IDK about you, but to me, this is a problem.  So I thought of an idea, an idea brought up before but with a little personal spin on it.

Just an idea, so please don't chastise me.  This has been suggested before, maybe with slight variations, but the core principles of this idea remain throughout the iterations.  Here's my idea of a way to protect yourself when faced by a "damned if you do, damned if you don't" situation, while keeping the sandboxy, PvPvE context of BDO in tact.

Aura of Protection:

1)  Players can attain one AoP per day via daily questline.  AoP is a flag you place anywhere in a Combat Zone.

2)  You place a flag and around the flag, an AoE named "Aura of Protection" is cast around the flag.

3)  AoP will cast a circular AoE around an area.  Exact size is yet to be determined, but let's say it covers a decent AoE, enough to cover the large part of, say, Star's End main rotation, for example.

4)  While within the AoP's AoE, your character will have an icon next to your name indicating you have casted an AoP when you are within the confines of the AoP's AoE.  You can be freely attacked by anyone, at any time, while inside your AoP's AoE.

5)  On the other hand, the caster of the AoP (you) is able to freely attack and PK anyone who enters the AoE.  No need to flag up.  Basically, it enlists Arsha Rules within the Aura of Protection without the need to alt+C.  Every player is automatically in PvP mode when in the AoP, caster or other.

6)  If a contesting player is able to destroy the flag, the AoP's effect vanishes and normal Karma penalties will apply.

7)  AoP's effect is persistent until the flag is destroyed, or when the caster removes it themselves.

The purpose of the Aura of Protection is to grant players with a certain amount of individual agency in protecting the rotation they have claimed, and help prevent the toxic scenario presented above.  The scenario that leaves players with literally zero options, aside from mob feeding, to rid the rotation from a griefer.  People who get PK'd while grinding get the protection of Karma -- attackers lose Karma, eventually go red, and play with the consequences.  While people who grief rotations in this way are able to do so, with no repercussion, leaving players with zero course of action to deal with this ina  way where they don't lose something, like Karma or the spot.  This will allow players to actually defend their rotations in a non-toxic way.  Because right now, there literally is none.

EDIT:  inb4 "JuSt Go To ArSha".  Arsha is when you WANT PvP.  Players grind on normal channels to earn silver.  Which is respected and recongnized by the large part of the community, I assume.  But there's a toxic minority, as in virtually all multiplayer games.

This is just an idea to give players who wish to grind on normal channels a way to protect themselves from this scenario.  Because on normal channels, there's nothing we can do about it, so this is just an idea to give us SOMETHING to deal with this scenario, that isn't a "damned if you do, damned if you don't" situation.  I'm sure others can think of better things! :)