Yes PVP is unfair.

[Flea King]

My thoughts to this:

1 & 2. No, too harsh. Without breaking immersion, how would the aggrieved party (the victim) claim damages against their attacker? What incentive is there for the killer/pirate if they run out of money after only a few kills? Imagine they destroy a T9 with 500t of Pain... they could bankrupt themselves in a single kill, when all they wanted was 50t of Pain. This is horribly imbalanced and will drive people away from this type of PvP entirely, IMHO - ultimately resulting in the death of the pirate career,
3. No. Just, remove insurance entirely for criminals. So when you die, you keep what money you have but you end up back in your next ship, or sidey if you don't have another,
4. For every non-Wanted player killed, all faction reputation will decrease (except for where lore applicable (such as a pirate faction, or similar)) ,
5. Agreed.
6. Agreed.
7. I would increase them slightly, and make them universal.

I hope we can agree that nobody knows how any one or more changes to the current system will effect player behaviour. We can theorise, make educated guesses and straight out gamble, but nobody with any sense will state that they 'know' what will happen should any number of the proposed changes be implemented.

Sure, on paper we can guestimate a cost analysis of a certain action and then extrapolate how such actions repeated a number of times across a slice of the player base might take shape. Ultimately, Frontier, if they're serious about setting up a game system that best reflects their 'vision' of the Elite galaxy, need to use the test server more, to try out new things on a smaller scale, with the caveat that testing and the related changes are under no obligation to ever reach the Live server.

Of course, the sample size of players will be considerably smaller compared to Live, but it would allow them, both developers and players, the play space to test suggestions and better gauge them. Again, and I feel this needs to be restated, under the caveat that testing and changes are under no obligation to ever reach the Live servers.

 

[Snarfbuckle]

You raise a good point - the player's kill counts of both players and NPCs could be compared in some way to spot a penchant for attacking players, rather than just Combat Rank alone.

How detailed would these logs be?

CMDR: X
Ship: Anaconda
NPC Kills: 12
CMDR Kills: 246

Target Ship Type: 86% Sidewinders 14% Eagles

Etc...

 

[Robert Maynard]

How detailed would these logs be?

CMDR: X
Ship: Anaconda
NPC Kills: 12
CMDR Kills: 246

Target Ship Type: 86% Sidewinders 14% Eagles

Etc...

Given that each player's account needs to be able to be reviewed (for example the race to triple Elite), I would expect that the logging is quite detailed. In my example, only 8 32-bit integers would need to be stored - comprising the combinations of "player?"; "wanted?"; "lower combat rank?", i.e.

1) player; wanted; lower;
2) NPC; wanted; lower;
3) player; not wanted; lower;
4) NPC; not wanted; lower;
5) player; wanted; not lower;
6) NPC; wanted; not lower;
7) player; not wanted; not lower;
8) NPC; not wanted; not lower;

.... although 3 of the NPC related counters could maybe be dispensed with.

 

[Cosmos]

Hello Commander Bumbles!

I'm interested in your opinion. Even though these penalties would only be applied in cases where there was a very clear mismatch of ability *and* a crime was committed, you think it would be a deterrent to player versus player activities.

Do you (or any other folk, feel free to respond), feel that there should be no additional penalties for lopsided encounters? That the world should remain uncaring and cold as is (don't worry folk, this isn't a trick question - there's no right or wrong answer!)?

I can't argue against lopsided encounters based upon rank with a few conditions.. Frankly pwning harmless commanders should be dealt with in some manner, particualrly in the starter area. I can't think of a worst encounter than a tooled up ship crushing noobs for fun - its counter productive and turns people off the game etc.. or into solo or private group. I suppose the question is where do we draw the line? At what rank? I'd imagine at Novice you should have grasped the game enough to be a contender.. Another thing that I wonder about, and forgive if I don't understand what rank is displayed for a commander but I could imagine a scenario where a player has never shot at another ship but could have traded themselves to an armored Anaconda.. Those guys shouldn't be immune from attack imo.

 

[LaFleur]

This thread has so many awesome ideas. If FD implements only a few of them Open Play would be so interesting. I hope the Devs understand the huge potential this game has if handled correctly.

 

[Snarfbuckle]

This thread has so many awesome ideas. If FD implements only a few of them Open Play would be so interesting. I hope the Devs understand the huge potential this game has if handled correctly.

Exactly, and it is not merely to provide law and order within civilized systems but also to actually PROMOTE crime.

Hell, it's bloody difficult to PLAY as a criminal CMDR since all your crimes tend to be forgotten.

We need NOTORIETY as opposed to REPUTATION in this game.

Mission Running = REPUTATION

Criminal Activity (Smuggling, Piracy, Murder) gives NOTORIETY

 

[_Dastardly_]

Current motor insurance companies quite often have to handle both sides of insurance claims - they do not necessarily refuse to re-insure the person who caused the incident (although they might bump up their premium / excess somewhat).

Pretty sure if someone driving a car rammed another car off the road deliberately, and was then chased by the police and their car was damaged when they were caught. Would be uninsured.

 

[Bran Tse Mallory]

Why not remove the game from their account while you're at it? And how would you reconcile those 'suggestions' (at this point I'd say you're just trying to flamebait rather than make genuine suggestions)

Removing the account would be stupid and as for the accusation of me making a troll post (Very cheap dig BTW)... Am I not allowed to voice my opinions?

To my mind these would make piracy require an amount of skill - you can get cargo without destroying the traders ship. They would have to be careful where they go to sell the goods and it also makes the plain old player killer think a lot before just killing a player.

In short it add's real risk to players who break the law. In what way is that a troll post?

 

[OamodSias]

Current motor insurance companies quite often have to handle both sides of insurance claims - they do not necessarily refuse to re-insure the person who caused the incident (although they might bump up their premium / excess somewhat).

In South Africa, there are instances where your insurance company will not cover the damages to your car, whilst making you pay the excess for the damage on the other persons car. It's all about guilt, recklessness, etc. They certainly won't pay out if you go around killing people in your car, become a "Most Wanted" then crash into a tree and try to claim.

The Pilot's Federation however was:

Formed in 2805 after the great surge in private ownership of smaller starships, the Pilots Federation soon found a role as a conduit for trade route information exchange between trusted pilots and provided the infrastructure for a mutual protection scheme against the rising scourge of interstellar pirates.

The following section...

The Pilots Federation’s zero tolerance policy of dishonourable behaviour amongst its members is enforced by a system of bounties automatically placed on the heads of transgressors.

...indicates that part of their zero tolerance policy should clearly mean the expulsion of transgressors; which means no insurance for pirates. Which is yet another aspect of the game that violates the lore.

Something that came to mind:

1. Consistent player killing lowers reputation substantially with all but anarchy/lawless and some independent factions,
2. After a certain number of killings, the pirate is expelled from the Pilots Federation,
   1. Flagged as Wanted in all systems, except for anarchy/lawless and some independent systems,
   2. Player loses all ranks (Combat/Trade/Exploration) as they are directly linked to the Pilot's Fed,
   3. Player's ranks are now earned through a criminal organisation similar to the Pilots Federation,
   4. Insurance is provided by this organisation, but at inflated prices,
3. All ranks with Empire and Federation are reset (this will require a change to the mission system to make it easier to rank up again),
4. * In order to return to civilised space, the player is required to clear all their bounties by committing good deeds (through a new mission system focused on Charity; Charity earns favour with some organisations who will then offer to pay off some of your bounties as a thank you for your contribution),
5. Once reputation has been earned and bounties removed, the player is given a once-off pass to Shinrarta Dezhra where they must dock at Jameson Memorial, pay several hundred thousand credits and re-register with the Pilot's Federation - only then can they start their new life on a clean slate. During this time however, they are marked as "lawless," will that that entails.

* By the time the player has received this level of negative reputation with the galaxy, their bounty will be extremely high; meaning paying it back through the Charity system will take a lot of time.

 

[Muetdhiver]

Dear Sandro,

Just seems to me that ED is discouraging pvp more and more instead of sorting out instancing and combat logging.

Look at this scenario: I am lowly "Expert" pvp-er (since beta) with more that 1000 human kills (shame you removed the counter in gamma)

When in my silent DBS I kill one of those "Elite" npc-hunter Cmdr's in their Anacondas do I get extra points towards my Elite status?

Should all pvp-ers just reset save and stay in sidewinders to give the PVE crowd a level playing field?

In this game pilots ranking has nothing to do with PVP skill. FD devs have very little expirience of pvp and I invite you to join one of our hunting wings to see what this is all about.
To count the number of combat logs, unseen wingman and unseen members of other wings, failed interdictions

This is what you should be focusing on, but I get it we are 1% of your target group and who cares

I only see it discouraging "PvP", but actual PvP would be fine. Then again, if I was into "PvP", I would be very sad indeed.

 

[[VR] Mad Mike]

Formed in 2805 after the great surge in private ownership of smaller starships, the Pilots Federation soon found a role as a conduit for trade route information exchange between trusted pilots and provided the infrastructure for a mutual protection scheme against the rising scourge of interstellar pirates.

The Pilots Federation’s zero tolerance policy of dishonourable behaviour amongst its members is enforced by a system of bounties automatically placed on the heads of transgressors.


The following section...

...indicates that part of their zero tolerance policy should clearly mean the expulsion of transgressors; which means no insurance for pirates. Which is yet another aspect of the game that violates the lore.
.

I absolutely knew that there was a lore reason why members were treated differently than none members despite being told i was mistaken. good work on finding a source for this.

 

[Arithon]

My thoughts on this are that a "griefer" is someone that murders other players for no monetary or strategic gain. A random serial killer. Does it for giggles to cause other commanders grief.

How would I define this?

The victim

• Is not Wanted
• Is not a member of an opposing PowerPlay faction (Enemy)
• Is not refusing to give up cargo*

The penalty for the attacker could then be as punitive as necessary.

*The exception is for piracy. There needs to be a formalisation of piracy. A pirate should be able send a "hand over some cargo" message as a function of their ship (maybe enabled when a cargo scanner is purchased). This gives the trader a set time (15 seconds) to drop cargo or become a "valid" target for attack. Their FSD would be cooling during that time, so they could not jump away. If they drop any cargo, they are classed as "co-operative" and are not a "valid" target. Any CMDR killing an invalid target would be treated as a griefer. This means traders who want to fight or run, would be "valid" to attack without incurring more than the normal bounty.​

This seems like the most straight-forward way to isolate griefers behaviour so that punishment measures can be taken.

i.e. an instant Wing of seven security Vultures arrives and intervenes the moment an attacker causes hull damage to a victim (fast federal response). Hull damage not shield damage, so "accidental" fire is not misinterpreted. Just don't fire on innocent unshielded commanders.

Whether these rules should apply to killing NPCs? Not my call.

Piracy, bounty hunting and PowerPlay remain unaffected. Thoughts? Improvements? Refinements?

 

[[VR] Mad Mike]

yep i can buy that... tho to become a valid target would also only happen AFTER a successful cargo scan so that the pirate knows the player has cargo to drop.

to speed up the process and stop the plaer from just running without recourse the cargo scanner should work in super cruise as well, so on 1 hand the pirate learns whats in the ships hold before dragging out of supercruise, but the flip side, the trader gets a heads up that someone is sniffing around then - which is something npcs already do due to them messaging us in advance.

perhaps the pirate could be scanning whilst interdicting, and this could be a balance thing, if its something they are doing at the same time it could make their actual interdiction a little harder.. just an idea.

 

[pantbash]

Hello Commander Bumbles!

I'm interested in your opinion. Even though these penalties would only be applied in cases where there was a very clear mismatch of ability *and* a crime was committed, you think it would be a deterrent to player versus player activities.

Do you (or any other folk, feel free to respond), feel that there should be no additional penalties for lopsided encounters? That the world should remain uncaring and cold as is (don't worry folk, this isn't a trick question - there's no right or wrong answer!)?

The world should care, in Elite the insurance companies should care.
If you cause enough insurance claims then (eventually) the insurance companies should send constantly send out very high ranked AI wings to hunt the pirate down.
Kill them enough times to make the insurance CEO happy.

I think this fits the lore of the ultra capitalist nature of elite.

 

[KellyR]

My thoughts on this are that a "griefer" is someone that murders other players for no monetary or strategic gain. A random serial killer. Does it for giggles to cause other commanders grief.

How would I define this?

The victim

• Is not Wanted
• Is not a member of an opposing PowerPlay faction (Enemy)
• Is not refusing to give up cargo*

The penalty for the attacker could then be as punitive as necessary.

*The exception is for piracy. There needs to be a formalisation of piracy. A pirate should be able send a "hand over some cargo" message as a function of their ship (maybe enabled when a cargo scanner is purchased). This gives the trader a set time (15 seconds) to drop cargo or become a "valid" target for attack. Their FSD would be cooling during that time, so they could not jump away. If they drop any cargo, they are classed as "co-operative" and are not a "valid" target. Any CMDR killing an invalid target would be treated as a griefer. This means traders who want to fight or run, would be "valid" to attack without incurring more than the normal bounty.​

This seems like the most straight-forward way to isolate griefers behaviour so that punishment measures can be taken.

i.e. an instant Wing of seven security Vultures arrives and intervenes the moment an attacker causes hull damage to a victim (fast federal response). Hull damage not shield damage, so "accidental" fire is not misinterpreted. Just don't fire on innocent unshielded commanders.

Whether these rules should apply to killing NPCs? Not my call.

Piracy, bounty hunting and PowerPlay remain unaffected. Thoughts? Improvements? Refinements?

Only kick I have here is the security squad arriving instantly upon hull damage. Space is big and vast. And cannot be policed effectively except at starports and possibly outposts. I would say if Report Crimes Against Me is on then a security squad should arrive within 1 to 3 minutes, as determined by RNG after the hull damage. This probably won't save the trader, but will get the offender the terrorist (griefer) tag. Technically, the time should start upon receiving the piracy demand, but this is not good for gameplay and FD has said Gameplay trumps physics (a wise decision imho).

I'm a trader/smuggler by preference, but I feel compelled to look at more than what is just good for me, but what is good for the game as well. I don't like being pirated, and certainly wouldn't like to be killed because the RNG said 2m30s response time. But regardless of my preferences, it is not logical for them to instantly magically appear. They might be dealing with something else just as important when the call comes in and in any event it is unlikely that they will be within 20 seconds of supercruise from your location at any given time.

 

[Jamesey1981]

To be honest I don't do much pvp, and I've never been ganked yet but to be honest I think if you're in open you should take your chances, if you don't want pvp there's private group to avoid it, but I think private groups need to be added to Xbox pretty sharpish as pve players have no escape there if they want to play with others. Really don't approve of killing noobs in the starting systems though.
Here's a daft idea that would be pretty amusing, let's have "Trapwinders", something like a bait car, harmless, clean, No faction NPCs that cruise around in or near the starting systems that show up as players, they wouldn't respond sensibly to comms, but a fair few noobs don't anyway as they haven't worked out the comms yet, or are busy learning to fly.
Would be Ganker spots trapwinder and interdicts, then 20 massively heavily armed unkillable (not actually unkillable, but effectively so) security ships drop in and wipe them out quicker than an FSD charge.
I did say it's a daft idea, and really won't work, but imagine how funny it would be to watch.

 

[KellyR]

Like I mentioned, the issue is that currently in game a proper scan is what is necessary to determine if you are wanted/smuggling or not. The implementation of this means that the station would start scanning people docking. Suddenly we now have an issue with players with minor mistake bounties (shot an NPC/cop by mistake) or players smuggling illegal materials being scanned and bad things happening to them. If you make it so that the station only scans you to determine that you killed a player or not, then it becomes an issue of needing a justifiable explanation in game. To "FIX" the issue of random killers requires more than just slapping a bandaid punishment on it. Unfortunately I cannot offer a proper solution right now but I hope this critique is at least helpful.

No need for scanning. Every ship has a transponder beacon with a unique signature. This signature is what is sent. It takes an hour for the message to reach systems more than 10 light years away but less than 51 light years away. It takes a day (24 hours) for the message to reach the rest of the galaxy. The transponder signature is entered into the stations docking system. Except Anarchies who don't participate in the program. When someone requests docking, the transponder signature is compared to known png's (personae non grata) and if there is a match, docking is automatically denied.

 

[lysan]

Hello Commanders!

Usual caveat: no guarantee, no ETA! This is just another thought experiment.

A quick question regarding player-versus-player (not AI) in open:

Currently there is no real difference between crime against AI and crime against humans.

Do folk think that additional, relatively severe in-game penalties for illegal ship destruction where there was a large disparity between rank/power of murderer to victim would be a worthwhile thing?

As an example suggestion: a high combat rank player in a combat capable ship boils a low combat rank player in a trade vessel. In addition to a bounty, the murderer is unable to dock at high security systems and suffers an increased insurance premium excess for an amount of time.

Continued offences of this nature increase and prolong the punitive measures.

Would a system like this help reconcile the two factions of the PVP and PVE, or would it not really address the issue?

Thoughts?

Yes, However it must applies in both mods. If you commit a crime in open it will follow you in SOLO as well.

 

[KellyR]

You live and you learn. When I was a new player I thought it would be a good idea to take on an Anaconda with a Viper. You can imagine how that turned out for me.

Well, yeah, if you take your stuff to someplace like Riedquat or Phekda. There's no law there at all. But if you take it to someplace like Leesti or Barnard's Star those should be pretty safe systems. Then some griefer comes along and kills you and gets off with a 9000 cr bounty that goes away in a week? When you've lost everything? How is that even close to being right. People will actually quit over things like that. And that would be a shame because then they will have missed something special. And all because some psycho nut was bored.

 

[Chummy62]

Hey btw.. I always get quite passionate about discussing this area of the game. I mean no offence to anyone, but if I did or do upset some - sorry about that

I apologie as well if I have been passionate about supporting PVE. I for one believe in a different kind of future where conquering space is the common bond that keeps humans working together rather than killing each other.

I just thought of something. Did you see the movie "The Martian"?

Most everyone was pulling for and cheering when he got rescued. How would this occur in Elite Dangerous?

A pirate would interdict the ship on it's way to rescue him and steal the cargo. Bad Ending!

A phycho would just interdict the ship and destroy it. Bad Ending!

I believe in a future where we would work together to have the story end with our Martian getting rescued.

This is the difference in our mindsets.