Deliberate Ramming

Implementing karmic consequence to a player's habitual use of ungraceful disconnection when under attack* by another player would seem to me to be a step in the right direction, compared to doing nothing.

*: subject to considerations regarding the relative karma of attacker and target, alluded to by Sandro.

Yes but the recent impression was not that Frontier were doing nothing, it was that logger(s) were being banned. The reddit drama from the guy I mentioned earlier, who got a permanent ban, had an incredibly benign deterrent effect.

Now that is undermined.

The impression given to the habitual, sidey-slaughtering, combat-logging, player-base has gone from:

Before this thread

"Wow, I might get permanently banned like that guy on reddit. I'd better not log even though SDC/AA are currently downing my FSD"


After this thread

"Phew, false alarm, that guy on reddit must have been a one-off, nothing will happen to me until they publish this karma system and I'll be able to consider that in great detail and, heh, work out my next move. Back to logging with impunity I go in the meantime!"


A terribly, terribly retrograde step just after we seemed to have really moved on. As a number of PvP-ers had commented elsewhere, it was incredible recently to have a brief period of real 'karma' in which serial combat loggers were actually being destroyed.

Really?

As a Die Hard PVEr who dabbles in open from time to time, I think combat logging is just as bad in the 'spirit' of the game as griefing. I know that some commanders feel that it's their only defense against overpowered griefers, but if this karma system is going to work, then CL has to be considered just as bad.

I think there may be a misunderstanding here...?

I'm saying that Sandro's remarks about combat logging are (to me and other PvP die-hards) disappointing in their leniency.
 
After this thread

"Phew, false alarm, that guy on reddit must have been a one-off, nothing will happen to me until they publish this karma system and I'll be able to consider that in great detail and, heh, work out my next move. Back to logging with impunity I go in the meantime!"
You would have to be a moron to assume that the existing system was no longer in effect, just because a new one was being talked about.
 
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You would have to be a moron to assume that the existing system was no longer in effect, just because a new one was being talked about.

Yes, but the problem is, looking at Sandro's comments about what might feature in a new system in the future, and noting those Cmdrs who appear (many times) on a certain sub-reddit in logging vids, how sharp would you say the teeth of 'the existing system' currently appear to be?

Increasingly it does appear that the reddit guy who got banned may indeed have been a one-off. It would not be surprising if there was stuff about his case that he chose not to disclose (a number of redditors accused him of hacking as well as logging, for example).

And he is the one and only known example of a ban, ever. I have seen loggers talking in Eravate in local chat about just getting the occasional warning, nothing more.

Sadly it appears to me that a period of benign deterrence (even if, fortuitous deterrence and perhaps even misplaced and overstated deterrence) by reason of said reddit drama has just ended.
 
Yes, but the problem is, looking at Sandro's comments about what might feature in a new system in the future, and noting those Cmdrs who appear (many times) on a certain sub-reddit in logging vids, how sharp would you say the teeth of 'the existing system' currently appear to be?
I think the current system is more or less totally ineffectual. But, anyone who assumes Sandro's comments here have altered the existing system is just guessing and just as likely to be wrong as right.

Increasingly it does appear that the reddit guy who got banned may indeed have been a one-off. It would not be surprising if there was stuff about his case that he chose not to disclose (a number of redditors accused him of hacking as well as logging, for example).

And he is the one and only known example of a ban, ever. I have seen loggers talking in Eravate in local chat about just getting the occasional warning, nothing more.

Sadly it appears to me that a period of benign deterrence (even if, fortuitous deterrence and perhaps even misplaced and overstated deterrence) by reason of said reddit drama has just ended.
IANAFE (I am not a Frontier employee) so take this as unfettered opinion, but..

The issue (I suspect) with "the current system" is that it's not automated enough (doesn't automatically collect 'evidence' which can be considered trustworthy) and there are insufficient resources allocated (at Frontier) to do a "fair" job of it and so most of the reported cases aren't solid enough for Frontier to act upon. I suspect the reddit case was especially solid, and so action was taken. You might also be right that there was hacking involved, which would be easier to prove, I think, as there has been mention of automated tools for detecting this.

This is why Sandro is looking into a Karma system, because without it (IMO) you're not going to see many, if any, repeats of the reddit case/ban.

In short, we need a better system for preventing combat logging.. and Griefing.. and any other behaviour which is detrimental to the game/community.
 
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I think there may be a misunderstanding here...?

I'm saying that Sandro's remarks about combat logging are (to me and other PvP die-hards) disappointing in their leniency.

Erm. How can they be Lenient? From the spitball list they're worse than griefing. So in order of severity ;-

  1. Repeatedly attacking clean ships that you massively overpowered would get you major bad karma.
  2. Repeatedly disconnecting ungracefully in danger over time would get you major bad karma.
  3. Attacking starports as crew would get you major bad karma.
  4. Being repeatedly involved in starport collisions over time would get you major bad karma.
  5. Attacking a clean ship when massively overpowered would get minor bad karma
  6. Being involved in an occasional starport collision would gain you minor bad karma

The Karma Free List
  1. Attacking a wanted ship, no matter how overpowered you were compared to it, would be fine
  2. Stealing cargo from a clean ship would be fine.
  3. Occasionally disconnecting ungracefully in danger would be fine

It occurs to me from these lists that Sandro and Frontier consider serial combat loggers to be as big a threat as serial Griefer. Don't think you can complain about that. You have to remember a karma system builds up a profile of a player over time, so only after a period of time will the system recognizes Bad Karma Behavior and take appropriate action. In addition, this kind of system only works if a player karma improves over time, so if they stop CL or Griefing then after a little while, the penalties are removed.

Occasional disconnects are fact of life and you cannot punish a player if they've only disconnected once during combat or at any other time. The attacker doesn't die, they're just a little frustrated. However, occasionally killing a player (while being vastly overpowered) in Forced PVP should cause a small Bad Karma. You have stopped another player's game and probably caused a lot of bad feeling in the process.

Exceptions for Griefing (or overpowered ship attack) should be
  1. Anarchy systems (that's why they're anarchies after all)
  2. All CZs (If you're in a low CZ and you see a high powered player on the opposite side GET OUT!)
  3. Has Rez Zones
  4. Some CGs

Exceptions for Combat logging : None.

The reason for the Karma system is because of the pier to pier networking. Frontier won't change that, so you have to work with other possibilities and so far a Karma system does appear to be the best option. AND before anyone says they should have it on a client server system, forget it. Frontier can't afford the WoW server farm that would require and therfore NO Elite:Dangerous. Full stop!
 
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Sounds like a great idea. Good luck, and fingers crossed we'll see it in game.

I am not anti PvP and would hope that this could actually add depth to the game - none of us is a goody two-shoes all the time, and those who want to live and die by the sword could still do so (except the most egregious examples), and be rewarded with deeper gameplay (being a fugitive, etc).
 
I never expected this to go on for almost 60 pages and involve so many staff comments when I did this topic. It's great to see a decent debate like the old days. Thanks to all involved.

I should reiterate that any Karma system should only ban (read shadowban) the extreme cheaters. Just because someone kills players in-game is no reason to ban them. The game is advertised as a cut throat galaxy and it should be. BUT, there should be real world consequences for carrying major negative Karma around, especially if in HighSec systems.

Refused docking (or station services denied), higher insurance premiums and more expensive refuel, repair and restocking costs are a good way to dissuade negative play. Stations opening up on extreme neg Karma players automatically. If a player wants to go down that road, they should not be banned just for that. We need to accommodate all play styles. Will make things interesting when a neg Karma player with a shattered canopy needs to dock as their air is running out, and permission is denied.

The starter systems are problematic. Some have said no weapons should be allowed at all in starter systems, but that won't stop interdictions and ramming, for example.

The biggest thing for me is a Karma identifier on the CMDR ship. When I select that CMDR's ship as a target, I want to see what sort of Karma they carry. Then I can decide what I need to do.

If a trader and interdicted, you can see that pirate has decent Karma and you can decide to deal with him/her. If heavy negative, you know you'll probably not survive the encounter and will run or high wake immediately.
 
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I never expected this to go on for almost 60 pages and involve so many staff comments when I did this topic. It's great to see a decent debate like the old days. Thanks to all involved.

I should reiterate that any Karma system should only ban (read shadowban) the extreme cheaters. Just because someone kills players in-game is no reason to ban them. The game is advertised as a cut throat galaxy and it should be. BUT, there should be real world consequences for carrying major negative Karma around, especially if in HighSec systems.

Refused docking (or station services denied), higher insurance premiums and more expensive refuel, repair and restocking costs are a good way to dissuade negative play. Stations opening up on extreme neg Karma players automatically. If a player wants to go down that road, they should not be banned just for that. We need to accommodate all play styles. Will make things interesting when a neg Karma player with a shattered canopy needs to dock as their air is running out, and permission is denied.

The starter systems are problematic. Some have said no weapons should be allowed at all in starter systems, but that won't stop interdictions and ramming, for example.

The biggest thing for me is a Karma identifier on the CMDR ship. When I select that CMDR's ship as a target, I want to see what sort of Karma they carry. Then I can decide what I need to do.

If a trader and interdicted, you can see that pirate has decent Karma and you can decide to deal with him/her. If heavy negative, you know you'll probably not survive the encounter and will run or high wake immediately.

well, i would be happy to have player profiles ingame that i could open.
some of that data should be written by the player,
some of it should be statistics generated by the server (this includes Karma and a combat rating that is not a static grind status)
 
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There is no magic bullet to "solve" disconnections - Sandro said as much.

Sure there is, make it all offline. [haha]

magic bullet.PNG
 
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Gets refund from credit card fraud division, buys key that may have been obtained via fraud. Seems legit.

- - - Updated - - -



Sure there is, make it all offline. [haha]

View attachment 120586

You're making a lot of accusations and assumptions. It's irrelevant anyway.

Maybe someone got the game as a gif and wanted to make a quick 2$

I personally don't think Horizon is worth more than 10$ right now.
 
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You're making a lot of accusations and assumptions. It's irrelevant anyway.

Maybe someone got the game as a gif and wanted to make a quick 2$

I personally don't think Horizon is worth more than 10$ right now.

The only assumption was irony. No accusations. I'm not above buying a game on the cheap, I've done it before.
 
Yes, but the problem is, looking at Sandro's comments about what might feature in a new system in the future, and noting those Cmdrs who appear (many times) on a certain sub-reddit in logging vids, how sharp would you say the teeth of 'the existing system' currently appear to be?

Increasingly it does appear that the reddit guy who got banned may indeed have been a one-off. It would not be surprising if there was stuff about his case that he chose not to disclose (a number of redditors accused him of hacking as well as logging, for example).

And he is the one and only known example of a ban, ever. I have seen loggers talking in Eravate in local chat about just getting the occasional warning, nothing more.

Sadly it appears to me that a period of benign deterrence (even if, fortuitous deterrence and perhaps even misplaced and overstated deterrence) by reason of said reddit drama has just ended.

The teeth of the existing system to deter/punish combat logging are as sharp as those of the existing system to deter/punish griefing. We're all in the same boat now. All waiting for this karma system to finally be implemented and hopefully have a significant impact on multiple behaviours which threaten to damage the game itself.

Personally, I believe tying both griefing and combat logging into the same karma system may turn out to be a masterstroke. A system focused just on one or the other would have PvP and PvE players (generalising both groups here) opposing each other, with one side calling for draconian punishments and the other side trying to water the punishments down or simply opposing the whole thing. But this way both parts of the playerbase will hopefully agree that the system needs to be strong but fair, even if only to be able to get what they want out of it.

If either group feels a certain type of action is warranted against the worst offenders on one side of the coin, they will have to either accept that the same type of action is warranted against the worst offenders on the other side, or consider that what they want they might not be being reasonable in the first place.
 
Hello Commanders!

Thank you for all the constructive criticism and appraisal (remember, attack the argument, not the speaker).

First the CAVEAT: I am not saying when this system is coming, or even that it is coming at all. I am merely discussing the pros and cons of what it might be able to address, and what it would not. It's also not "the fix" to crime and punishment, just one of several options.


Thumbs up to the principle of a long-term karma system that looks to address the long-term problems the game has with lack of consequences for antisocial play.
 
Wow, just wow ... so much salt going on here. I for one quite well understand logic behind automatic system which will make 'dissconnecters' (not only :) ) life 'interesting' and see it as very clever idea. I myself was once in role of server staff (few years) banning offenders and something like this would be huge help. You cry how all this is bad idea bcs it not acts asap ... the best imo is that this system (karma) can infact react much quickly and much more precisely as it's now, when I estimate is reported maybe 1/10 of all logs.

p.s. I also like other presented aspects of karma :) ...
 
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Personally, I believe tying both griefing and combat logging into the same karma system may turn out to be a masterstroke. A system focused just on one or the other would have PvP and PvE players (generalising both groups here) opposing each other, with one side calling for draconian punishments and the other side trying to water the punishments down or simply opposing the whole thing. But this way both parts of the playerbase will hopefully agree that the system needs to be strong but fair, even if only to be able to get what they want out of it.

I'm afraid I think that if implemented it would represent a massive victory for those at the extreme anti-griefing end of the spectrum of opinion.

Very broadly speaking we are discussing three types of behaviour:

1. Clearly in-game actions such as straight up gun murder.

2. Clearly out-of-game actions such as jerking a network cable out of its socket so as to effect an immortality cheat.

3. In-game actions that - arguably - fall into a more grey area such as suicide station ramming so as to trigger a starport speed offender execution.

Items falling into category 3 may form an interesting basis for discussion and led to this thread.

I am dismayed by the proposition that items falling into categories 1 and 2 might be thought to fall onto the same sliding scale.

Out of game cheating is a separate and much more serious issue than purely in-game actions and should be dealt with separately and more seriously. To deal with an aggressive Cmdr and a cheat on the same scale is wrong.
 
... Out of game cheating is a separate and much more serious issue than purely in-game actions and should be dealt with separately and more seriously. To deal with an aggressive Cmdr and a cheat on the same scale is wrong.
Tricky is that you have in more cases virtually no proof/certainty that player cheats. Tracking suspect behavior over time while step by step issuing 'warnings' type 'disalowed to dock' or 'equipment price was increased bcs' could have much better impact in long term view. Brave offender may decide try how bad things can come against him if he continue but most of 'small' (majority) just will stop doing forbidden stuff.
 
seal clubbing and constant griefing also has a big "out of the game" impact.

1. the number of key refunds on steam are affected by this
2. the reputation of the game is affected by it
3. the game experience for many if affected by the actions of a few

if you look at it from another perspective, two things come into my mind:
the south park WoW episode,
and this:
http://thenoobcomic.com/comic/303/
 

Robert Maynard

Volunteer Moderator
seal clubbing and constant griefing also has a big "out of the game" impact.

1. the number of key refunds on steam are affected by this
2. the reputation of the game is affected by it
3. the game experience for many if affected by the actions of a few

Probably why Sandro mentioned the health of the game a few times in his posts in this thread.
 
Wow, just wow ... so much salt going on here. I for one quite well understand logic behind automatic system which will make 'dissconnecters' (not only :) ) life 'interesting' and see it as very clever idea. I myself was once in role of server staff (few years) banning offenders and something like this would be huge help. You cry how all this is bad idea bcs it not acts asap ... the best imo is that this system (karma) can infact react much quickly and much more precisely as it's now, when I estimate is reported maybe 1/10 of all logs.

p.s. I also like other presented aspects of karma :) ...

I have to agree, and after reading so many threads about serial combat loggers and the lack of response from FDEV on these players, it is clear to see that the current mechanics to handle this is far from working and this also implies that FDEV do not collect enough data or if they do, they cannot use the collected data efficiently.
So adding automatic mechanics that can analyze and flag certain kind of behaviors, like combat logging. it should be fairly easy to see pattern between serial combat loggers and people with unreliable internet connections... As the serial combat loggers would almost always have their disconnects under certain conditions, they would never do this if they are winning, but people with bad internet could disconnect all over the place, not just when they are in danger. And ontop of this, the peeople with bad internet connections, would also have a slew of other trails in the logs due to their bad connections, but a serial combat logger, who tries to game the system, by doing 10-50 "random" disconnects to simulate bad internetconnection, would not have these kind of traces in the logs.
These kind of systems are not supposed to work very fast, they are supposed to catch up to "offenders" over time. making the gaming of such system much harder!

And when this of system is in place and working, the system would have a profile of each player... that is the base for your "karma" score. So if you have been flagged by the system as a repeat combat combat logger, the system knows that analyzing your lastest disconnection under certain condition would need to be prioritized for analyzing, and now the system could react faster to repeadly doing unwanted things.

So a Karma system would take a time to get the base line pattern of a new players behavior, but once a pattern is seen, the system can respond faster... so it takes time to get noticed, but once on the notice list, the system can act faster when behavior repeats. Ie doing few combat logging over long period of time, would most likely never get you bad Karma, but doing several times a week, would after a few weeks put on a fast track to really bad Karma.


So if this would be implemented, depending on how much alternations they need to do to get the datapoints needed to evaluate, it could take a few weeks before such system would kick in, but I would assume that FDEV would put the underlying changes in place to collect the data before they would actually announce the system. So they could from day one ramp up a players true Karma accroding the individual players profile already gathered. And I would not expect the system to put the "true" Karma in place at once, as players who would recieve a really bad Karma would have very little notice and possibility to react to the changes, ie, get out of high security systems while their Karma is still going down, fast, so they can seek refuge in an Anarchy system, while they ponder on what todo... how to continue blaze their own path in the galaxy, now that they galaxy truly have added some places that now would be truly dangerous for them to venture too....





* I have used combat logging as an action, replace that with suicie ramming, going all murder hobo on clean players etc etc. whatever of these actions that today have very little negative impact on the player doing it, but can have huge effects on their targets.
 
3. In-game actions that - arguably - fall into a more grey area such as suicide station ramming so as to trigger a starport speed offender execution.

Whoa, what?

I'm sorry, but how on earth is exploiting a flaw in the system for the purpose of griefing a "grey area"? There's no question that's it's not-OK, it's not being done with "roleplay" in mind, it's not being done for any in-game goal, it's purely done to screw with other players for no reason whatsoever with no retribution, no consequences of any kind of significance.

That's not a "grey area", dude.
 
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