Slave Carriers Update

[Lev -Shadow- Arris]

I believe that the actions of FDev are somewhat over-stepping here and heavy-handed (though I do agree that at the end of the day it's their prerogative to determine the applicability of the Code of Conduct). An in-game mechanic was used, without any cheating, and in-game mechanics exists for those "enslaved" to "escape". The PSA on both the Launcher and in-game as a spoken News article and readable in GALNET was good, and was enough to address the issue. The "moral" implications of this don't hold any water for me since there's literally a slave trade already in the game (Imperial Slaves) - since the concept of slavery is already present and tolerated/promoted in the game in some aspects I don't think it's unreasonable for a player (frankly who's dumb enough to fall for this) to get "enslaved" and have to find a way out. Player groups were organized by friendly/outraged players to also deal with this, again in-game, and managed to have a handle on it. Finally on that point, there's multiple resources to learn about the Self-Destruct option as well (including by accident

).

My biggest issue with the bans/resource confiscation is that its a penalty to players that found an inventive way to play that wasn't against the spirit of the game and technically even those "enslaved" were given what they were promised (new minding ships and a place to go mining), they just didn't read the fine print

This to me is something that puts a damper on trying to find new ways to play in an open-universe where law & order is sparse (especially outside the Bubble) and I think creative play like this should be praised for the creativity it brings vs. banned. Honestly actions like this make me less interested in the game (the open-universe & blaze your own trail aspects are what I love most) since I have to wonder if I come up with something interesting but morally dubious would FDev step in to stop it even though it isn't against the rules?

I hope the "slavers" win the appeal.

 

[Rubbernuke]

 

[VR StarLightPL]

You'd probably need to reach 200% in heat to purge all the corrosive enzymes you'd get on your eyeballs from reading ED global chat, if stuff like Borann is any indication.

Interestingly enough, I was mining the egg in Solo a bit when it was a thing out of curiosity (no, I still don't have a carrier), just before it was nerfed. The system chat was actually a nice place to be. There were actual conversations happening, plus carrier schedule advertisements. It really felt like living breathing galaxy without the usual douchebaggery of Open. And was a nice break from the dullness of mining. But I might have been just instance-lucky, blessed by no kids and manbabies in my TZ/AZ.

 

["Red" the Pirate]

Players: "Where's this 'emergent gameplay' the devs keep talking about?"

Emergent gameplay: happens

Players: "NO!! YOU CAN'T DO THAT!! THAT'S ILLIGAL!!! "

Welcome to Elite: Dangerous. Enjoy your stay.

 

[Deleted member 182079]

Interestingly enough, I was mining the egg in Solo a bit when it was a thing out of curiosity (no, I still don't have a carrier), just before it was nerfed. The system chat was actually a nice place to be. There were actual conversations happening, plus carrier schedule advertisements. It really felt like living breathing galaxy without the usual douchebaggery of Open. And was a nice break from the dullness of mining. But I might have been just instance-lucky, blessed by no kids and manbabies in my TZ/AZ.

It was very much hit & miss - at times it was alright (lining up with what you describe above) but all too often I had to either hide syschat (which was a shame as pirates or gankers would announce their presence there sometimes) or outright block individuals who spammed the chat with inane at best, and deeply unpleasant crap at worst.

It eventually also triggered the bad boy in me and led me to building my first PvP pirate ships. In fact, with some players I was downright prepared to gank them but could never find them in Open unfortunately.

 

[Phisto Sobanii]

I don't really care if I get flamed on this, so...

The vast majority of people on the forum are not new to the game. If you're reading this, you've been around a while, and you understand the game mechanics.

The people getting scammed don't know how the game is played. They probably don't know about self-destruct. They may not know about the freewinder. There are a lot of assumptions being made.

Basically, if I was in that position, I'd assume I was completely screwed and would have to start over. That drives players out of the game.

In short, what the crap slavers was everything short of cool, and defending on the grounds of introducing new aspects of the game is bovine excrement. You people know better. You're clearly okay with exploiting new players. You're also probably okay with kicking kittens, too.

Gank new players in open. That's part of the game. Picking on Harmless players as Elites gets you nothing. It isn't even a challenge. It does nothing except stroke your ego by kicking said kitten. That said, that IS part of the game, so no serious issue there.

Lying to players to board a carrier, jumping them 600+ LY away and tricking them into mining... that's exploitation. That's not a game mechanic. That's deception.

Flame me all you want, but remember that right now you're acting from a position of entitlement. You know the system, you exploit the system (so do I, mining FTW), and even if you're not actually doing the slaving, it's clear that you tacitly condone it.

I don't care who you are, but it's a Richard move and you know it. Stop being a Richard. Find someone your own size to push around, and stop being a damn bully.

What if deception is part of the game?

 

[Starshot_Jigawatts]

pray tell what is the exact difference so these two go in the different categories of good and evil in your personal divine truth world?

both are interactions using intended mechanics of the game, both are cases of "abuse of a position of superiority". they just differ in their respective narrative (a quick gank in open might have a very condensed one ), and in that one has been explicitly stated as "part of the game" by frontier and the other ... oh, wait, after rivers of ink we still hardly know factual data about. just vague hearsay. yet you have your mind all made up, of course. because it contains "slave" and "kids".

A bit tired of reading this narrative that those of us with just a baseline level of ethics are super goody goodies on a crusade. Or we're not informed of the facts so are being mislead or something.

If you can't see the difference between a simple gank and this scheme, you aren't even actually trying to have a discussion on this. You are just forcing an absurdly obtuse position.

Yes I have my mind made up that lies, deceit, and premeditated fraud for personal gains are generally bad things. Because, you know, I'm not a practicing sociopath.

 

[LeoBartlet]

View attachment 207830

Nicholas Cage will participate in literally anything these days.

 

[bitstorm]

Is this actually an official response from Frontier?
Someone posted the same on Lave Radio last night, seemed like a load of tosh.

 

[Phisto Sobanii]

A bit tired of reading this narrative that those of us with just a baseline level of ethics are super goody goodies on a crusade. Or we're not informed of the facts so are being mislead or something.

If you can't see the difference between a simple gank and this scheme, you aren't even actually trying to have a discussion on this. You are just forcing an absurdly obtuse position.

Yes I have my mind made up that lies, deceit, and premeditated fraud for personal gains are generally bad things. Because, you know, I'm not a practicing sociopath.

I'd like to point out Braben doesn't agree with you. What with causing trouble for other people in Elite being core to the experience.

 

[VR - wickfut]

A bit tired of reading this narrative that those of us with just a baseline level of ethics are super goody goodies on a crusade. Or we're not informed of the facts so are being mislead or something.

So anyone who doesn't tow your line is missing a baseline level of ethics?

If you can't see the difference between a simple gank and this scheme, you aren't even actually trying to have a discussion on this. You are just forcing an absurdly obtuse position.

Yes I have my mind made up that lies, deceit, and premeditated fraud for personal gains are generally bad things. Because, you know, I'm not a practicing sociopath.

It's a game. An open world game where you can go out and shoot and kill other people. A game where you can collect slaves, transport them and sell them for profit. They made FC knowing it could jump to systems and leave people stranded. I've been stopped by some youtuber live streamer saying "join our cult or die" , I died. I didn't cry about it to some online rag. I didn't get peoples online gameplay revoked. I didn't try and make it some political statement.

 

[LeoBartlet]

and now we've reach the amateur psychology phase of the thread.

 

[Deleted member 38366]

Players: "Where's this 'emergent gameplay' the devs keep talking about?"

Emergent gameplay: happens

Players: "NO!! YOU CAN'T DO THAT!! THAT'S ILLIGAL!!! "

Welcome to Elite: Dangerous. Enjoy your stay.

Isn't it telling about the Game if "emergent Gameplay" always seems to involve

• mangling others
• killing others
• extorting others
• screwing others over

I don't know, looks like a clear pattern to me
Tells alot, doesn't it?

This Game appears to require some form of detox....

 

[Starshot_Jigawatts]

So anyone who doesn't tow your line is missing a baseline level of ethics?



It's a game. An open world game where you can go out and shoot and kill other people. A game where you can collect slaves, transport them and sell them for profit. They made FC knowing it could jump to systems and leave people stranded. I've been stopped by some youtuber live streamer saying "join our cult or die" , I died. I didn't cry about it to some online rag. I didn't get peoples online gameplay revoked. I didn't try and make it some political statement.

No, that is not what I was saying. But acting like we're screaming bloody murder when we're really just saying "Yeah, that was kinda scummy..." is just a strawman narrative I'm sick of hearing. Of course this was a scummy thing to do to other players, duh. It's not extreme to point that out. That's just baseline ethical awareness.

Now the thing is, yes, this is "just a game" where you can do things in a virtual world etc etc. We get all that. But even in a game, you can cross a line. We just don't all agree on where that line is, fine. Nothing wrong with that.

 

[LeoBartlet]

Isn't it telling about the Game if "emergent Gameplay" always seems to involve

• mangling others
• killing others
• extorting others
• screwing others over

I don't know, looks like a clear pattern to me
Tells alot, doesn't it?

This Game appears to require some form of detox....

What of the emergent gameplay that exists to help others? Fuel rats for example?

 

[VR - wickfut]

. But even in a game, you can cross a line. We just don't all agree on where that line is, fine. Nothing wrong with that.

Please explain the exact point which that line of yours was crossed. [I've read the rag article and some reddit, if there's more then I don't know it]

 

[LernanRuss]

If you can't see the difference between a simple gank and this scheme, you aren't even actually trying to have a discussion on this. You are just forcing an absurdly obtuse position.

Yes I have my mind made up that lies, deceit, and premeditated fraud for personal gains are generally bad things. Because, you know, I'm not a practicing sociopath.

Well, you've just wrote, that murdering somebody is ok, but offering a job as rank-and-file miner is not. Well, I don't know about your practice, but as for you not being sociopath - I wouldn't go to so far conclusions.

 

[Lev -Shadow- Arris]

I don't really care if I get flamed on this, so...

The vast majority of people on the forum are not new to the game. If you're reading this, you've been around a while, and you understand the game mechanics.

The people getting scammed don't know how the game is played. They probably don't know about self-destruct. They may not know about the freewinder. There are a lot of assumptions being made.

Basically, if I was in that position, I'd assume I was completely screwed and would have to start over. That drives players out of the game.

In short, what the crap slavers was everything short of cool, and defending on the grounds of introducing new aspects of the game is bovine excrement. You people know better. You're clearly okay with exploiting new players. You're also probably okay with kicking kittens, too.

Gank new players in open. That's part of the game. Picking on Harmless players as Elites gets you nothing. It isn't even a challenge. It does nothing except stroke your ego by kicking said kitten. That said, that IS part of the game, so no serious issue there.

Lying to players to board a carrier, jumping them 600+ LY away and tricking them into mining... that's exploitation. That's not a game mechanic. That's deception.

Flame me all you want, but remember that right now you're acting from a position of entitlement. You know the system, you exploit the system (so do I, mining FTW), and even if you're not actually doing the slaving, it's clear that you tacitly condone it.

I don't care who you are, but it's a Richard move and you know it. Stop being a Richard. Find someone your own size to push around, and stop being a damn bully.

I have been playing less than a month, so I think that qualifies me as "new", yes? I believe the "slavers" weren't in the wrong here, they stayed within the game mechanics and found a creative way to do this. I wrote a longer comment already, but the short versions is:

1. If you're dumb enough to fall for this kind of thing in the first place you that's on you. If a "free ship" with a 2ly Jump Range wasn't a red flag you've not been paying attention even a little. "But the windowless van said 'free candy', how was I supposed to know?"
2. The "freewinder" (I like that term) and "Self-Destruct" were items I learned about on day-1 by checking out ship screens for information/functions, and reading the descriptions. Also there's a TON of resources online, 15 seconds on Google will get you the info even if you're only looking in the general direction of "What if I explode?".
3. Slavery is already a part of the game (Imperial Slaves), so morally there's no leg to stand on there - abstracted NPC's vs. players dumb enough to be tricked into a version of it doesn't really seem different to me.
4. It was innovative and inspiring in terms of how truly open the universe is, seeing it punished is more of a deterrent to those of us that do want freedom to try new ways of play - the morality of that should be up to us to decide as individuals so long as it's not actual cheating (e.g. Combat Logging).

Finally, if anyone kicked my cats, I'd be in real jail for what I'd do to them. No one messes with my kittens!

 

[Deleted member 182079]

So anyone who doesn't tow your line is missing a baseline level of ethics?



It's a game. An open world game where you can go out and shoot and kill other people. A game where you can collect slaves, transport them and sell them for profit. They made FC knowing it could jump to systems and leave people stranded. I've been stopped by some youtuber live streamer saying "join our cult or die" , I died. I didn't cry about it to some online rag. I didn't get peoples online gameplay revoked. I didn't try and make it some political statement.

The thought of the countless younglings perished in agony as a result of your disgusting indifference towards crimes against humanity committed in this vidjo game makes me sick.

 

[Starshot_Jigawatts]

Well, you've just wrote, that murdering somebody is ok,

I said that was ok? Where?

I said it was different.