What is incognito?

[Swift-Li]

Is it a way to avoid taxes?

[Adrian124]

When your karma is negative, you are treated as a criminal and attacked on sight in most cities (Derphy is the only exception IIRC). Incognito temporarily disables this effect, so that even if you are a criminal you can still talk to people and trade **for a short while**.

I've never tested it but from what people are saying on Discord it's not really viable to try to not pay taxes and then use incognito when going to cities - the effect of the spell is just too short.

[Lamiosa]

Are there any benefits from being criminal, or is it just either punishment or a hard mode for some people?

[Adrian124]

Originally posted by Lamiosa:

Are there any benefits from being criminal, or is it just either punishment or a hard mode for some people?

As far as I know it only makes the game harder, no benefits

[Skivin]

The status of being treated as a criminal is purely detrimental, but the actions that make a city hostile to you in the first place can be pretty enticing. If you don't mind playing an evil ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥, it can be quite profitable to steal and murder a bunch in the early game to get a bunch of money and resources, and join the thieves guild asap since you're going to be nuking your karma score anyway. Then, once you've gotten your fill of the criminal life, use incognito to slip into town and start being a good boy, get that karma back up, and start paying your taxes.

As far as trying to use incog to avoid taxes entirely while still frequenting cities though, yeah, nah, it's not worth it because it's a rather short duration. As a criminal most of your time is gonna be spent running from or killing guards, and you only whip out the magic disguise when you have a specific plan in mind.

[Zombie Teddy Bear]

its worth doing once if you plan on joining the thief guild and worth staying a criminal to train up those skills but it is a pain having to use incogneto to shop and avoid the guards.

Once you can defeat guards without issue its not a huge deal unless you have AOE attacks