I do hope Season 2 helps Piracy - Today's experience just confirms to me it doesn't work very well...
- Thread starter NeilF
- Start date
It tells me nothing, because you did not tell my why you consider my post offensive.
If you can make a point as to why I offend you, I'm the first to step back, apologize and either put you on my ever growing ignore list - and you might think it's because I'm easiely offended - I'm not, OR alter my post and/or my point to the best of my abilities.
And I appreciate your proper wording already, because you wrote "you consider my post offensive" and not "your post is offensive".
So, why do you consider my post offensive?
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First point: there is no way for the pirate to know you've lowered landing gear or cargo scoop.
Second point: the minute it looks like you combat logged, you are not going to talk anymore, you are getting blown up if he can do it.
That's a valid question: How can they make in-game interaction more responsive and quicker, so that a 10 second delay doesn't mean that everyone is assuming you're timing out?
Though, from his point of view, maybe he was firing to drop your shields and would have given you a chance once they were down?
The way I see it, you've got at least a half a dozen near instantaneous responses.
- Shut off shields. (This will never become a thing, because everyone is terrified of blowing up.)
- Immediately type back 'okay' or 'let's talk' and then propose negotiation.
- Open Voice Comms. (The delay in them receiving the ping should give you enough time to type your message.)
- Jettison 5-20 tonnes immediately, then ask to negotiate. (I've done this before an was usually left alone after dumping it.)
- Deploy hardpoints. (This means you're intending to fight, but it is an immediate response.)
- Maybe flash your headlamps really quickly to acknowledge. (It is unclear that this message will be understood.)
It appears that you think the Comms response is not instantaneous enough. That's fine. Not everyone types quickly. You still have more options available to you.
I'm guessing, from your post, that you want an easily apparent 'I surrender' button? Press it and the pirate is notified you surrendered, preferably this would go hand in hand with killing your Thrusters and shutting down. Essentially, asking FDev to input a couple of hotkeys which function as macros and potentially could even be recognized by NPC pirates. It's a good idea, and it could have three options:
- Kill thrusters, turn on headlights, send the mesage: 'I submit! Please don't hurt me!' (This could also be used when interdicted by authority vessels?)
- Send distress beacon, send the message: 'Eat propellant!'
- Send distress beacon, deploy hardpoints, send the message: 'Pirate scum!' (It wouldn't do anything else, but it would be an immediate response as a statement of intent.)
If these 'canned' responses were able to trigger a reaction layer to NPC interaction, it could add more variety to the gameplay.
You do have options within current gameplay mechanics other than combat logging. But, yes, it could be interesting to provide CMDRs with a quicker way to respond to piracy.
The upper right Info box can be used to display several more alerts, like a wing invite or an incoming hail, and have the Accept/Cancel options right there, when the window is focused.
I was stationary, he pulled up right infront of me almost immediately, so I thought lowering landing gear and opening my hatch (both which I have mapped easily to hand) might be a nice quick visual indication
Maybe not the best plan, but I was trying...
Some of these take time, especially if you're not used to doing them. eg: Jettisoning 5-20T of cargo (quickly).
And most of the others give no reassurance that you are not still looking at a 15 second countdown. ie: Flash headlights... Say something... Jettison 1T of cargo... THEN sit there watching a 15 second timer countdown. ie: The pirate has been shown a carrot, and 15 seconds later you vanish...
I think first of all, the EXIT option needs to be addressed. How about this:-
1) If you press EXIT and you're watching the timer countdown... That is also displayed on all other players HUDs in the instance. ie: The Pirate can clearly see you are exiting the game (to avoid them).
2) While in the countdown, there is a damage multiplier to any damage done to your ship. eg: 150%. So if the pirate starts shooting you because of your avoidance, you'll pay for it. ps: How about shooting/destroying a ship in this state is not penalised by the crime and punishment mechanics?
Next:-
1) Combat logging is penalised. Ideally if the game can detect you combat logged (connection went down to other player(s) and FD server) you are penalised somehow.
2) Crime and punishment is kicked into something more realistic, so mindless destruction is not a very appealling option for pirates.
If other things can be added such as mechanics to allow interdiction terms/messages and payment to pirates more intuitive/easier... Great!
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So the pirate has a system option to "Hail on Interdiction"?
So the victim then gets your proposed hail option when the pirate is interdicting them?
Ideally then, the "ACCEPT" should be a very obvious/easy key (which is also documented on the screen)? eg: "Press Fire 1 or 2 to Accept"
The only problem I see is if the victim then, doesn't have a mic. So they can hear your terms, but you the pirate are none-the-wiser if they are responding back, and indeed if they even speak the same language as you!?
But, the proposal would certainly help in most cases surely? So I like it...
ps: Obviously if the victim accepts the coms hail, and they lose the interdiction, the voice channel should carry on into the interdiction normal flight situation too!
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better comms? its called macro's.. i have my pirate demands under the press of a single button.So I thought I'd drop a couple of loads of Land Enrichment units off to Vennik today to kill 20mins...
As I was flying towards Nixon Enterprise station, I was interdicted by a CMDR who I could see was wanted, oh dear a pirate or griefer?
I submitted to the interdiction, so as to allow myself a quicker FSD cooldown, and as soon as we entered normal flight I was relieved to see terms issued by the pirate... Good! Not a mindless griefer!
Great I can "play along" and pay up! Piracy mechanics actually at work! He wanted 100T of cargo! Cool! He's stealing cargo off incoming traders to no doubt sell them probably not just for the profit, but also to even contribute towards the CG. Nice!
So fair enough I think... I'm already at a halt, but deploy my cargo scoop and landing gear as a sign of submission, and then go to type something to the effect that I will pay up...
While doing this, the other CMDR then starts to nudge me, and after not many more seconds then I'm being fired upon... Seems all bets are off now... Do I continue trying to type in a message to him? Do I scoot over to the right hand panel and faff about handing over cargo? Do I still trust him as a "legit pirate" and not just a griefer?
So here we have the pirate mechanics showing their fragility, or in truth basic lack of existence:-
- No easy way to say, "Don't shoot I comply!"
- No easy way to pay up to the demand... Faffing about in the right hand panel in a short amount of time, while under threat of fire?
- A 15 second EXIT from the game, which risks a pirate thinking any inactivity is the victim about to teleport (EXIT) out.
So frustrated that my best efforts to "play along" having failed... Annoyed that I could have just have taken the EXIT option for an better outcome most likely... I can't even be bothered to press "J" to jump, so I just "pull the plug" - I can't be bothered to faff now, or worse still die due to what I perceive as a daft frustrating misunderstanding due to the poor mechanics.
However, I then enter into the game ASAP again, back into OPEN, in the hope he's still there in that location/instance so I can catch the CMDR to hopefully try again, and make the mechanics work! I want to be pirated! I want the game to work!!!
The moment I appear, I'm under fire... Clearly the other CMDR is frustrated at the way his interdiction has gone... I "pull the plug again", but enter in ASAP yet again, desperately hoping a third attempt might end in me being able to actually do this "properly" and simply hand over the 100T of cargo. Alas, the moment I appear, I'm under fire again...
I give up, and go to SOLO, where of course none of these problems exist... (as such)
Now other times I've been pirated - ignoring griefers - it has managed to work at times, but undoubtably many Pirates are quicker to shoot than they'd like (or should) simply because the game doesn't orchestrate/control/help piracy. And of course "victims" are always wary due to the number of "griefers" simply flying "pirate colours"...
Give better coms?
Allow a pirate to dictate their terms?
Maybe even allow a victim to "offer an I surrender" mode?
Maybe allow a victim to more easy pay the demands, without having to faff in the right hand panel, all the time which the Pirate is thinking, they're exiting the game...
Maybe increase the ESCAPE time to 20-30 seconds so pirates are no paranoid about 5 seconds of lack of activity/coms?
Maybe if you press ESCAPE and are trying to exist the game, show the countdown in game to all other players... ie: So a Pirate can see you are trying to sneak out via this mechanic.
Allow a rank/score for the pirate to show (victims) how good they are at their trade. Getting cargo, no mindless destruction.
It just frustrates the hell out of me I want to play in Open and actually don't mind being "pirated". I want to see the game working and "alive". But the game is so weak in this area, it drives me go to SOLO just to skip these frustrations and not suffer due to the misunderstandings and resultant faff
Note: Criticize if you must for "pulling the plug". But frankly, IMHO, if the game is running under flawed ill-considered mechanics, and even my best attempts cannot make it work correctly, I give up! Getting attacked (or destroyed) because the game can't "facilitate a piracy transaction" between to willing participants just does my head in!?
Note: I actually caught the CMDR later on for a chat, and explained I was actually trying to pay when he misconstrued my inactivity as an EXIT attempt, if only to make him feel less frustrated by the whole debacle
This is of course not a unique post. Many people have posted their suggestions to improve/tighten up piracy. I do hope something is planned... I want to see a logical and workable mechanic in action! It has to work for the TRADER --> PIRATE ---> BOUNTY HUNTER food chain to even stand a chance of working as it could/should.
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better comms? its called macro's.. i have my pirate demands under the press of a single button.So I thought I'd drop a couple of loads of Land Enrichment units off to Vennik today to kill 20mins...
As I was flying towards Nixon Enterprise station, I was interdicted by a CMDR who I could see was wanted, oh dear a pirate or griefer?
I submitted to the interdiction, so as to allow myself a quicker FSD cooldown, and as soon as we entered normal flight I was relieved to see terms issued by the pirate... Good! Not a mindless griefer!
Great I can "play along" and pay up! Piracy mechanics actually at work! He wanted 100T of cargo! Cool! He's stealing cargo off incoming traders to no doubt sell them probably not just for the profit, but also to even contribute towards the CG. Nice!
So fair enough I think... I'm already at a halt, but deploy my cargo scoop and landing gear as a sign of submission, and then go to type something to the effect that I will pay up...
While doing this, the other CMDR then starts to nudge me, and after not many more seconds then I'm being fired upon... Seems all bets are off now... Do I continue trying to type in a message to him? Do I scoot over to the right hand panel and faff about handing over cargo? Do I still trust him as a "legit pirate" and not just a griefer?
So here we have the pirate mechanics showing their fragility, or in truth basic lack of existence:-
- No easy way to say, "Don't shoot I comply!"
- No easy way to pay up to the demand... Faffing about in the right hand panel in a short amount of time, while under threat of fire?
- A 15 second EXIT from the game, which risks a pirate thinking any inactivity is the victim about to teleport (EXIT) out.
So frustrated that my best efforts to "play along" having failed... Annoyed that I could have just have taken the EXIT option for an better outcome most likely... I can't even be bothered to press "J" to jump, so I just "pull the plug" - I can't be bothered to faff now, or worse still die due to what I perceive as a daft frustrating misunderstanding due to the poor mechanics.
However, I then enter into the game ASAP again, back into OPEN, in the hope he's still there in that location/instance so I can catch the CMDR to hopefully try again, and make the mechanics work! I want to be pirated! I want the game to work!!!
The moment I appear, I'm under fire... Clearly the other CMDR is frustrated at the way his interdiction has gone... I "pull the plug again", but enter in ASAP yet again, desperately hoping a third attempt might end in me being able to actually do this "properly" and simply hand over the 100T of cargo. Alas, the moment I appear, I'm under fire again...
I give up, and go to SOLO, where of course none of these problems exist... (as such)
Now other times I've been pirated - ignoring griefers - it has managed to work at times, but undoubtably many Pirates are quicker to shoot than they'd like (or should) simply because the game doesn't orchestrate/control/help piracy. And of course "victims" are always wary due to the number of "griefers" simply flying "pirate colours"...
Give better coms?
Allow a pirate to dictate their terms?
Maybe even allow a victim to "offer an I surrender" mode?
Maybe allow a victim to more easy pay the demands, without having to faff in the right hand panel, all the time which the Pirate is thinking, they're exiting the game...
Maybe increase the ESCAPE time to 20-30 seconds so pirates are no paranoid about 5 seconds of lack of activity/coms?
Maybe if you press ESCAPE and are trying to exist the game, show the countdown in game to all other players... ie: So a Pirate can see you are trying to sneak out via this mechanic.
Allow a rank/score for the pirate to show (victims) how good they are at their trade. Getting cargo, no mindless destruction.
It just frustrates the hell out of me I want to play in Open and actually don't mind being "pirated". I want to see the game working and "alive". But the game is so weak in this area, it drives me go to SOLO just to skip these frustrations and not suffer due to the misunderstandings and resultant faff
Note: Criticize if you must for "pulling the plug". But frankly, IMHO, if the game is running under flawed ill-considered mechanics, and even my best attempts cannot make it work correctly, I give up! Getting attacked (or destroyed) because the game can't "facilitate a piracy transaction" between to willing participants just does my head in!?
Note: I actually caught the CMDR later on for a chat, and explained I was actually trying to pay when he misconstrued my inactivity as an EXIT attempt, if only to make him feel less frustrated by the whole debacle
This is of course not a unique post. Many people have posted their suggestions to improve/tighten up piracy. I do hope something is planned... I want to see a logical and workable mechanic in action! It has to work for the TRADER --> PIRATE ---> BOUNTY HUNTER food chain to even stand a chance of working as it could/should.
I think you're missing the point(s)?
So you issue your demands... and then? If you don't see any action in 10 seconds what then? And if the player then disappears 5 seconds after that?
It's all too open to abuse and misinterpretation...
My suggestions from earlier today for example:-
I presume that was calculated in order to make the point that FD still have not adressed that pressing matter of the evil combat logger except in a change of the EULA, which he thinks is not sufficiently enforced.
If it helps: I had 3 real, ISP related disconnects on sunday, while being in a highly profitable looking High Res. When I dropped, there were about half a dozen 150k+ ships aligned for me to harvest .. errr .. preach the word of our lord and saviour.
I re-establish the connection and that bounty hunter's wet dream was replaced with a few wings of low-payout of high ranked eagles and adders. I refuse to relog or re-enter "instances" to reroll the RNG, so I decided, if the payout was not that great, at least I could raise my combat rating.
That was foiled by another disconnect, which replaced my fast ranking oppertunity with wings of FAS/FDS/FGS - high effort, lowerish payout (compared to conda/python/FDL), slower kills ... meh.
I probably "lost" at least a million or two in kills and some % in rank progress.
Conclusion -> -shrug- It's a game. Sometimes you lose, sometimes the other's win.
Disclaimer: if my posts feel offensive, because I am in no position to lecture you about how to play games, look at the context and you might notice my clever use of the "tongue in cheek" approach. I made specifically sure that it's my cheek that tongue is poking, by presenting case studies of my own fails at this game. I've probably done every stupid thing in this game, including but not limited to jettisoning my limpets, ramming shieldless ships and getting a bounty, shooting authority ships and unscanned pirates, taking a bio break to find myself imploded in a sun and many many more.
I call my initiative "bad gamer for a good cause". Feel free to ignore me.
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Aye, I'm the one who isn't comprehending the problem.
I've already explained it to you. It would help both traders and pirates. I can't put it simpler. Less rebuy screens for the traders easier cargo for the pirates potentialy more pirates instead of striaght up PKers.
But explain to me what I'm not getting here.
TBH... I expected to get a lot more flack about combat logging... I know it is frowned upon by FD, but I hoped in giving a clear account of the events, the resultant discussion from my experience might further highlight the issues around the current mechanics.
But yes, I'm guilty of getting so frustrated at the game, I tried to reboot the situation, not just once, but even twice, in an attempt to desperately actually pay the pirate, almost out of principle at that point! In the end I just gave up in sheer total frustration... Guilty as charged!
Anyhow, I think if in Season 2, if just the following two things could be done, it would really help!:-
- The EXIT feature is tightened up. ie: So the timer displayed to a player was displayed to all players in the instance. This would help Pirates as they would not constantly be second guessing if a few seconds of non-activity is the victim simply watching 15 seconds counting down. And as I said, maybe even add a damage multiplier (150%) if you are being hit while in this phase. And maybe even ignore all crime/punishement rules too?
- Crime and Punishment is tightened up so as to make mindless destruction less appealling. I believe this is on the cards already - Fingers crossed!
I think just these two things will take the pressure out of pirate interdiction in the right fashion it stands more chance of playing out as both parties would prefer it to.
But I can tell you, after this experience (& some others), I just feel like it's not worth even risking CMDR pirates. Not due to the loss of cargo etc, but due to the resultant mindless/pointless destruction that can take place, even when it's not desired, necessary or for any good. And I suspect I'm not alone in this mindset, which is ultimately a bad thing for OPEN and therefore the game in general.
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Did you understand the Ultima Online reference?
That is a very old gripe and has been resolved by FD in my books by offering Open, Private Group and Solo.
OU tackled it by adding a copy of the game with "PvE only" ruleset - kinda shot from the hip but the easiest solution back in the day, when Cloud Solutions, Megabit WAN connections and P2P at that level, Dynamic Instancing (in EQ they still had to "manually" move Sebilis from ToV instances, who were located on the same physical machine when ToV became such a popular raiding zone that it crushed the most popular leveling/grinding zone's performance) and such were Star Trek Technology.
I had to convince a friend in the US to get me a beta CD (or was it diskettes?), because they did not ship to the EU back then and there was no way to download it and I was a big fan of the franchise. Uphill, both ways.
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Showing your age there lol
I remember 3.5" and 5.25" .. apparently there was an 8" but never saw one
I can't explain it as I would a child, thats just more work.
But going back to what you posted originally your problem is you associate laziness with permission, you think the fact that the bounty system was woeful was FD encouraging PvP behavior by not having any penalties.
Its vastly more likely that it was just bad architecture on top of bad design decisions, almost every action they take is more proof of that than anything, if they designed the system to give PvP'ers free reign it would be the only one they made that actually did what its supposed to
You also won't get very far with the frothing anti-pvp response because by merely posting it your giving them great enjoyment, I know If i was really into smurfing the noobs in the start area reading something like that would be better than a good week of noob tears. Its the trolling scale right? Trolling somebody who doesn't care is like a 2/10, but trolling somebody who is enraged as you seem to be would be 11/10.
I can't disagree with the comment about UO, Its long been a design principle that you shouldn't mix the PvE crowd with the PvP crowd I have no idea why they thought it was a good idea here except for going back to what i was originally saying, lazy design, its basically the we can't be bothered approach to the system. I'm still waiting for them to give up and make it the way it should be.
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This all seems to break down because the game is not following simple pirate methods. When oldy worldy pirates were strutting around with their peg legs and such, they had to 'attach' their ship to the target so they could board and swipe. The other ship couldn't get away and was forced to either pay up, die or attempt to kill all the skallywags.
I envision ED should be something more like this, the pirate would have to have a hard point mounted 'anchor' of sorts, like a harpoon weapon that they use to attach to the poor wretch. The weapon would electronically disable the FSD and stop them getting away to fast. the target can either submit, pay up and the pirate lets him go. If he chooses to hold on to his precious cargo he can either try to boost away ( taking about 60 seconds, more or less depending on the ships top speed ) to break the cord holding them back or turn and shoot. After 2 minutes, the target ships drones have removed the anchor and they get a chance to FSD out. Once 'anchored' neither party can log out without seeing a 2 minute cool down timer. Sounds awesome!
Ok so I'm dreaming alot of work for the Devs there and some stuff needs rethinking but really I do think there should be some sort of attachment mechanism or its just not proper pirating! oh, and there should be grog, lots of grog.
I envision ED should be something more like this, the pirate would have to have a hard point mounted 'anchor' of sorts, like a harpoon weapon that they use to attach to the poor wretch. The weapon would electronically disable the FSD and stop them getting away to fast. the target can either submit, pay up and the pirate lets him go. If he chooses to hold on to his precious cargo he can either try to boost away ( taking about 60 seconds, more or less depending on the ships top speed ) to break the cord holding them back or turn and shoot. After 2 minutes, the target ships drones have removed the anchor and they get a chance to FSD out. Once 'anchored' neither party can log out without seeing a 2 minute cool down timer. Sounds awesome!
Ok so I'm dreaming alot of work for the Devs there and some stuff needs rethinking but really I do think there should be some sort of attachment mechanism or its just not proper pirating! oh, and there should be grog, lots of grog.
And they mitigated it by adding the option of private groups.
And they buffed their EULA, because even a "keep out" sign does not stop some individuals from trespassing.
*Piracy* is part of the core game design. It's not spectacularly well implemented, but the sheer fact that there's hundreds and thousands of NPC Pirates in the bubble should be a pretty good indication.
And 200ly out of the bubble, there's still systems that haven't even been honk-scanned by anyone (Main Star still undiscovered). No Players, no NPCs - mode you're in doesn't even matter. Could call it the ultimate escapism in an escapism.
I am a mix of the PvE and PvP crowd in myself. From the start.
I played summer games and Uchi mata and international karate against my friends, when they were available and we could gather 2-4 joysticks as well as Bard's Tale and Ultima from IV to VIII and so on and so forth.
Played Team Fortress and CS and League of Legends and so on as well as years of EverQuest on PvE and LotRO, which only had a weird monster vs. people PvP.
Trolls were always trolls and probably always will be. Open the window, let the sunshine in and they'll turn to stone
Kinetic weapons - I use gimballed Autocannons - medium hull penetration, low hull damage (compared to cannon or frag cannon) and dedicated trading ships are sloooow and have a very low hull hardness factor (read the threads called "weapon damage tests").
You can take out any module you want (except weapons, they're on the outside but are neigh indistructible
) in very little time, once the shields are down.The "safety buffer" that shields offer can be set by the trader.
ALL pure trading ships I've had so far (Hauler, T6, T7, T9) have the option to either fit a pretty decent shield in the largest compartment (that's a size 8! for a T9. Biggest shield in the game - and pretty expensive) at the expense of cargo space (<- there's your insurance trade-off). Or fly with less shielding, hoping to get away with it (but it takes 2 shots with a burst laser to strip the minimum shield from a T7), or if they're daring and dashing (or playing in solo) and going for the max profit without shield.
Cutters and Clippers are completely different beasts. If you want to trade as safe as possible even in open, I'd say have a look at those two ships ... the empire cares for it's economic superiority.
If I see the Lord of Pirates fly around in an all thermal weapon loadout, demanding his prey to be held in place, I cannot but think:
At least Johnny Depp was pretty entertaining and cunning as pirate.
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Quite - ties in with FDs original idea of "hoisting the flag" (declaration of piracy) & Surrendering.
Couple with this 3 more things:
- Timer (can't wait forever!)
- Logoff message
- Piracy rating (that will encourage piracy and not just random murder*)
*Once you submit and hand over some cargo the expectation is that you will be killed anyway so why bother handing it over in the first place. The rating (like the other roles) does a few things: legitimises piracy as a VALID role within the game; progression towards Elite is (or should be massively) hampered by blowing up surrendered ships ... so once you surrender you know the chance of being killed regardless is lower.
Robert Maynard
Volunteer Moderator
I remember 3.5" and 5.25" .. apparently there was an 8" but never saw one
Not only saw them but used them in anger too....