There are some good ideas in this thread and I thought I might add a spin to it, rather than to start a whole new related thread.
Rather than a town "war", groups would be able to band together for missions against targets. It could work like fort battles as a mock-up top-down view of town, but use different skill sets for different mission types. This would require fighting types and some more specialized characters.
Also a 24 hour notice to the town would be used. numbers in the group should be limited to the population of the target town or some formula to calculate power based on cumulative levels. Missions should require a large energy value, so that they can not be done exclusively without the need to do regular jobs. Maybe require a small cash payment to start as a mission supplies.
Examples:
-robbing bank vault that would require some player with a high fine-motor skill to open the safe. higher level banks require higher skill and give greater cash reward.
-stealing horses that requires high animal instinct/horse riding and rewards victory based on highest level mount from general store.
-weapon/clothing thief that might use hiding.
-destoying town buildings might use construction skill. the abuse of the mission could be remedied by townspeople having to use repairing skill, rather than to actually rebuild buildings.
I am sure more ideas for interesting missions can be found. I don't want to overthink that here.
The rewards for missions should not come from the town that is under attack. They should be cash and experience just like regular jobs or just some type of new prestige ranking for the town. The attacker or defender can each earn them in a successful mission or defense.
A new town building Sheriff station may be helpful for small town, where increasing the level will add deputies, NPCs that fire on attackers until they are knocked out. Maybe just defeating shop owners who are difficult based on level of their building as a final step to win the reward.
Also there would be no point in a big town abusing a small town since there is very limited reward. Also there is no real damage done since the reward is not directly from town funds, so abusing would be painless for the victim.
Just a brainstorm from reading all about not changing character of the game and stuff. I like the game as it is now, but it has potential to have more intense, hands-on action on a limited basis.
tell me what is good and/or flame away!