Elite: Harmless - Karma System aka "be the Tamagotchi" - FRESH SALT, MINED RIGHT HERE

[Han_Zen]

That is true indeed. combat logging is still cheating.

But on the other hand and not trying negate Ziggys very valid point. The NPCs in this game are there for the players enjoyment not vice versa. They are the feeder pellets that packman eats or the Goombas Mario kicks around. They are integral to the game, but ultimately they are there to be enjoyed and used as a tool to move progression, story, or action in the game itself.

We would have to be very careful how many rights and privileges we give non sentient set pieces in the game. Especially with EDs combat centric focus

I see the point, but I don't quite agree. Giving NPCs rights and equal or better access to equipment can be educational in many ways.

If the game play divide between PvP and PvE is to be reduced, it's the only way.

The game would be different, but I think better.

 

[Faybs]

You're unhinged mate, you need help, seriously. It's a video game. Nobody is being killed. Let's keep the consequences of actions taken in a video game, in the video game instead of getting all hysterical shall we?

Thank you for proving my point If you're worried about getting banned from the game for bad behavior, it's clearly a good deterrent.

 

[Jack Schitt]

I've been musing on this today, and think the first thing that needs to be quantified is a flow chart to make it clear as and when karma, c&p or penalties are incurred, such as this easy example below: two players, ATTACKER and DEFENDER, wherein ATTACKER has killed the other one at a Combat Zone. Thoughts?

It looks as though you might have missed a branch, unless I've interpreted it wrong:

Spoiler

Other than that it looks good. It's more or less how Combat Zone etiquette works in Mobius' groups.

Scaling it up, or having parallel algorithms, to cover all PVP eventualities is where it gets problematic. I do think it would make sense though, as far as is practical and in an ideal world, for FD to outline the skeleton of their system in this way so that players can know exactly what rules are being applied. It might also help to catch obvious exploits before they make it into code.

 

[-Denali-]

It very much depends on the actions of the player. Do NPCs destroy players who have dropped cargo that meets their demands?

I suggested many pages ago that they create a preset cargo demand that could be hot keyed. That way the game could easily track if an ultimatum was given. Simply tracking if cargo was dropped by a clean pilot within 1 min of their death would allow the game to punish pirates who kill despite it.

PvP is not universally appreciated by the player-base, indeed, it would seem that Frontier are well aware that the majority of players do not get involved in PvP.

I completely accept this and am fine with it. However, this isn't a discussion about making a PVE-ONLY version of Open or a PVP vs PVE popularity contest. It's a discussion about setting reasonable consequences and boundaries for player engagements in free and open play. Imposing the bias of what should be a separate discussion about the need for a PvE-only environment on this conversation is simply too constraining to accommodate all of the different player perspectives. Necessarily, pushing such a hardliner view will kill any PvP.

 

[Robert Maynard]

I suggested many pages ago that they create a preset cargo demand that could be hot keyed. That way the game could easily track if an ultimatum was given. Simply tracking if cargo was dropped by a clean pilot within 1 min of their death would allow the game to punish pirates who kill despite it.

Various suggestions for formalising piracy have been made over time - one would be to base demands on the results of the cargo scan, using the scan output as the basis - then haggle back and forth based on that - which would neatly avoid any language barrier between players (as it would be rendered in the selected game language).

I completely accept this and am fine with it. However, this isn't a discussion about making a PVE-ONLY version of Open or a PVP vs PVE popularity contest. It's a discussion about setting reasonable consequences and boundaries for player engagements in free and open play. Imposing the bias of what should be a separate discussion about the need for a PvE-only environment on this conversation is simply too constraining to accommodate all of the different player perspectives. Necessarily, pushing such a hardliner view will kill any PvP.

Indeed it's not about making a PvE version of Open. It would seem to be about making Open a place that more players want to play in - and that, I would suggest, necessitates attracting PvE players out of Solo and Private Groups.

 

[Goose4291]

It looks as though you might have missed a branch, unless I've interpreted it wrong:

Spoiler

http://ed.pubimg.co.uk/karma2.jpg

Other than that it looks good. It's more or less how Combat Zone etiquette works in Mobius' groups.

Scaling it up, or having parallel algorithms, to cover all PVP eventualities is where it gets problematic. I do think it would make sense though, as far as is practical and in an ideal world, for FD to outline the skeleton of their system in this way so that players can know exactly what rules are being applied. It might also help to catch obvious exploits before they make it into code.

Yeah that was an error on my part.

I dont think its too hard to scale up (I'll be attacking it properly while Im home in a week or two) once you factor out the usual suspects that cause peoples concerns (ie. Report crimes, powerplay and bounties held).

 

[jasonbarron]

This is just a reformation of the earlier thread where Robert and a number of others lobbied heavily for a PvE Open mode. All this discussion is doing is shifting the goal posts to what they perceive as a more achievable goal, but with the same ultimate outcome.

 

[Robert Maynard]

This is just a reformation of the earlier thread where Robert and a number of others lobbied heavily for a PvE Open mode. All this discussion is doing is shifting the goal posts to what they perceive as a more achievable goal, but with the same ultimate outcome.

This is a karma thread - discussion about a potential system where player behaviours may be tracked and consequences applied for some specific PvP actions. That doesn't sound much like a PvE mode, does it?

Plus, Sandro introduced the concept of enhanced consequences for some PvP actions over a year ago then started fleshing out a possible karma system in the Deliberate Ramming thread recently. Therefore this is something that Frontier are considering implementing and, I would suggest, have been thinking about for a while now.

 

[jasonbarron]

Yes Robert, I'm aware of the cover that is being used which is why I suggested you scrapped the PvE Open talk to take a longer but perhaps more realistic goal of working through a karma system to get what you ultimately want: a game where nobody can shoot at you.

 

[Ziggy Stardust]

This is just a reformation of the earlier thread where Robert and a number of others lobbied heavily for a PvE Open mode. All this discussion is doing is shifting the goal posts to what they perceive as a more achievable goal, but with the same ultimate outcome.

Robert, Mobius, all PvEers all out to get PvPers out of Elite Dangerous.

Isn't it a little early to have been drinking?

Edit Good point Robert, add Sandro to that list.

 

[Robert Maynard]

Yes Robert, I'm aware of the cover that is being used which is why I suggested you scrapped the PvE Open talk to take a longer but perhaps more realistic goal of working through a karma system to get what you ultimately want: a game where nobody can shoot at you.

That's rather a conspiracy theory. I won't deny that I'd be quite happy for Frontier to introduce a karma system that would discourage particular player behaviours though.

Open-PvE mode discussion died down after DBOBE stated on a stream that it'd be really difficult to implement (i.e dealing with all the ways that players can cause damage to others or cause damage to be done to others).

 

[Faybs]

Various suggestions for formalising piracy have been made over time - one would be to base demands on the results of the cargo scan, using the scan output as the basis - then haggle back and forth based on that - which would neatly avoid any language barrier between players (as it would be rendered in the selected game language).

Within the context of this thread, formalizing piracy means that the game is in the loop when a pirate encounter occurs, and can make an accurate assessment of inappropriate weapons use. If the game is in the loop it's trivial then to be able to determine whether a ship destruction was "real" piracy where the victim decided to take his chances - it should be right in the logs whether the attacker used the piracy comms menu, whether the victim had cargo on board, whether they used the menu to reply back, and whether the victim pulled a runner. If the pirate did all he could to abstain from violence and the victim ran anyway, it should be perfectly within the pirate's rights to open fire with no loss to karma.

 

[jasonbarron]

Robert, Mobius, all PvEers all out to get PvPers out of Elite Dangerous.

Isn't it a little early to have been drinking?

Edit Good point Robert, add Sandro to that list.

I don't make any bones about it as that is exactly what I think. I'm not sure I'd lump Sandro into that category, but I will go so far as to say that he's paying too much attention to a group of players who never have and never will play in Open give him counsel on what would make Open great again.

 

[Robert Maynard]

I'm not sure I'd lump Sandro into that category, but I will go so far as to say that he's paying too much attention to a group of players who never have and never will play in Open give him counsel on what would make Open great again.

Who "has never and will never play in Open" that you suggest Sandro is listening to?

 

[Robert Maynard]

Within the context of this thread, formalizing piracy means that the game is in the loop when a pirate encounter occurs, and can make an accurate assessment of inappropriate weapons use. If the game is in the loop it's trivial then to be able to determine whether a ship destruction was "real" piracy where the victim decided to take his chances - it should be right in the logs whether the attacker used the piracy comms menu, whether the victim had cargo on board, whether they used the menu to reply back, and whether the victim pulled a runner. If the pirate did all he could to abstain from violence and the victim ran anyway, it should be perfectly within the pirate's rights to open fire with no loss to karma.

Trivial for the pirate to guarantee to get off karma-free - demand all of the cargo, even though the pirate can only scoop a small percentage of it - trader does not comply to an obviously unreasonable request - pirate destroys trader....

 

[-Denali-]

I've been musing on this today, and think the first thing that needs to be quantified is a flow chart to make it clear as and when karma, c&p or penalties are incurred, such as this easy example below: two players, ATTACKER and DEFENDER, wherein ATTACKER has killed the other one at a Combat Zone. Thoughts?

https://s26.postimg.org/xwqhx7i4p/20170520_185531.jpg

I like the chart but I think there should be one more split. After "has defender picked a side" it should have two options. One for "attacker has picked a side" -> "defender takes penalties" and another for "attacker hasn't picked a side" -> attacker faces penalties.

Basically though, this is the only sort of thing we really need to be talking about when it comes to deciding what is Karmic and what is just criminal.

The demands normally persist during the fight though, the NPC pirates do seem to make a reasonable effort not to kill the target.

Normally in such fights now, I am on the winning side so it is not likely that I would surrender. However, the point is still there and it is still valid.

The NPC pirates are not behaving like certain habitual killers that claim to be pirates.

It's simple enough to only apply bad karma to a killer if the clean player they killed recently dropped cargo. That's the appropriate way to judge that situation. Just blanketing it with bad karma is clumsy and game killing for an entire play style. The game doesn't need to be the wild west but it shouldn't be the UN either.

As for habitual killers claiming to be pirates - How often do you play in open and how often are you pirated by a player? How many times would you honestly say you've experienced this problem? Is your perspective mostly or entirely anecdotal? Station ramming and actual grief killing are far more common than pirates who kill regardless of cargo drops. That's because it would be extremely bad for business if it was the norm (no incentive for the trader to cooperate if they know they will die anyways).

 

[Faybs]

Trivial for the pirate to guarantee to get off karma-free - demand all of the cargo, even though the pirate can only scoop a small percentage of it - trader does not comply to an obviously unreasonable request - pirate destroys trader....

The game knows how much cargo the victim has and how much hold space the pirate has. If the pirate has 10t free and asks for 20t, well anyone can make a mistake. If he asks for the entire hold of a T9, he's being unreasonable.

 

[-Denali-]

The game knows how much cargo the victim has and how much hold space the pirate has. If the pirate has 10t free and asks for 20t, well anyone can make a mistake. If he asks for the entire hold of a T9, he's being unreasonable.

Maybe the best solution is to have every cargo scan end with the game sending an automated message that looks at how much cargo the trader has and how much space the pirate has and demands something appropriate.

 

[Faybs]

As for habitual killers claiming to be pirates - How often do you play in open and how often are you pirated by a player? How many times would you honestly say you've experienced this problem? Is your perspective mostly or entirely anecdotal? Station ramming and actual grief killing are far more common than pirates who kill regardless of cargo drops. That's because it would be extremely bad for business if it was the norm (no incentive for the trader to cooperate if they know they will die anyways).

The problem is that when you get interdicted by a much more powerful ship, you have no way of telling if it's a pirate or a griefer. That's why IMHO the karma system needs to come with a formalized way to do "acceptable acts of violence", such as piracy, blockades etc. The ship on the receiving end must always be given a chance to comply (hand over cargo, turn around, etc - it doesn't even have to be a comms menu option, a simple "system under blockade, press [j] to abort" when you're about to jump in will do)

- - - Updated - - -

Maybe the best solution is to have every cargo scan end with the game sending an automated message that looks at how much cargo the trader has and how much space the pirate has and demands something appropriate.

That would probably be the fairest, maybe with an option to haggle for +-50%

 

[Han_Zen]

This is a karma thread - discussion about a potential system where player behaviours may be tracked and consequences applied for some specific PvP actions. That doesn't sound much like a PvE mode, does it?

Plus, Sandro introduced the concept of enhanced consequences for some PvP actions over a year ago then started fleshing out a possible karma system in the Deliberate Ramming thread recently. Therefore this is something that Frontier are considering implementing and, I would suggest, have been thinking about for a while now.

The key point is really to the Karma system suggestion is the term 'massively owerpowered'.

My guess is that no medium or large ship kills will give negative karma, exept for station ramis.
FD will not introduce a system where you get an advantage by dropping the shields on your Conda.

This will not be adequate for for many players, that want just coop gameplay.

For players currently play in PG all the time, the Karma system will have no effect and they will not switch to open because of it.

Many PG only players still have a strong opinions about the karma system. I can see why JB may interpret that as strawman argumentation.

Personally I just think people enjoy forum PvP.