How dangerous will the universe be?

[JohnStabler]

By the title question, I mean how permissive will frontier developments be in regards to player behavior?

A good example is EVE. In EVE even the meta game is cut throat. Players have been known to scam in game currency out of each other via the forums. The developers take a hands off approach.

With other multiplayer games the developers will intervene where they feel there is unethical behavior e.g. restoring scammed items and currency, punishing griefers with bans.

[JeffRyan]

I sincerely hope that ED doesn't go the EVE online route in terms of playerbase. But I believe the only way forward is a hands off approach except for things that break 'real' laws. You start to police some things, where do you draw the line?

I think the playerbase is usually best at policing itself.

[JohnStabler]

I sincerely hope that ED doesn't go the EVE online route in terms of playerbase. But I believe the only way forward is a hands off approach except for things that break 'real' laws. You start to police some things, where do you draw the line?

I think the playerbase is usually best at policing itself.

So you hope for the permissive nature of EVE without the nasty players? We can but dream

[Andrew Sayers]

With other multiplayer games the developers will intervene where they feel there is unethical behavior e.g. restoring scammed items and currency, punishing griefers with bans.

Despite the P2P code architecture, the design team have generally shown a preference for strongly client/server gameplay. Missions are created by NPCs and events manually by Frontier, then handed over to players to have fun with. Given how much that puts their fingerprints on the universe, I expect it'll be hard for them to say "we intervened in X situation to make the world more fun, but we refuse to intervene in Y situation to make it less annoying".

My guess is we'll see a universe with acceptable behaviour strongly differentiated by location. I could even imagine behaviour that would get you banned for griefing in the up-top-left corner of the galaxy being rewarded in the down-bottom-right corner.

[Slawkenbergius]

It's a good question, and a very hard one to answer. On the one hand I don't want mollycoddling and sugar-coating and all the rest of it... No insta-ganking from the NPC police, even in core systems. On the other hand, the EVE meta-game seems kind of ugly in places, from an outside perspective. I can just see players twinking alts to cause havoc in the core systems without accruing a bounty on their main, and I don't really like it.

So given that I'd basically like an approach that gives punks the opportunity to ruin my enjoyment, I'm hoping the grouping system will be robust enough that I can find other people wanting to play in a dangerous universe without being annoying.

[JeffRyan]

So you hope for the permissive nature of EVE without the nasty players? We can but dream

As I've mentioned before this was a concern of mine and still is. But the fact that ED isn't a true MMO and people can chose how they interact with the game will go a long way to setting the tone.

[jabokai]

Dangerous enough that most players stay in the open multi-player groups, not so dangerous that most abandon them for private groups and solo.

[JohnStabler]

As I've mentioned before this was a concern of mine and still is. But the fact that ED isn't a true MMO and people can chose how they interact with the game will go a long way to setting the tone.

Even if it's not a full mmo, I think there's still scope for lots of unethical behavior. I'm just wondering how involved fd want to be. Hiring in game GMs will be costly.

[izzy]

Even if it's not a full mmo, I think there's still scope for lots of unethical behavior. I'm just wondering how involved fd want to be. Hiring in game GMs will be costly.

FD has to ban people having unethical behavior ... but how to do this without GM ?

[Nagual]

By the title question, I mean how permissive will frontier developments be in regards to player behavior?

A good example is EVE. In EVE even the meta game is cut throat. Players have been known to scam in game currency out of each other via the forums. The developers take a hands off approach.

With other multiplayer games the developers will intervene where they feel there is unethical behavior e.g. restoring scammed items and currency, punishing griefers with bans.

For the most part I think FD will just let the players do anything that the game rules allow. For example in one of the videos David Braben was talking about how excited he was to see player social development, and the example he spoke of was traders hiring other players to escort them, for a fee. Maybe the trader reneges on that, or gets attacked by the players.. I think they see this sort of thing as a real danger in the future universe and it's up to us to deal with it.

As far as griefers go, I'll quote from the Kickstarter FAQ:

How do we plan to address PvP (player vs player) “griefing”?
An obvious danger is an advanced player with a big well-armed ship in a busy system spends their time just picking off beginners, for fun.

To understand how this will be stopped requires a little bit of understanding how real player ships will be treated slightly differently to non-player ships. Players will automatically be part of a “Pilot’s Federation” and will be identified as such, together with their ranking and name. Bounties are paid by this Federation – something that is therefore much higher for those that kill other Federation members. It will be balanced so that this cannot be used as an exploit (so a beginner killing a beginner is taken less seriously than an Elite pilot killing a beginner – it will be based on the ranking difference).

There are four separate ways we will address this:

1. The offender will very quickly get a serious price on their head (bounty) and criminal record. That price on their head will attract bounty hunters.

2. Local police or military will respond very quickly and strongly to them.

3. It will be legitimate for other players to attack them for the attractive bounty without attracting a bounty for themselves, as once there is a bounty on their head they are officially a pirate and ‘free game’ for everyone.

4. If enough players complain about the offender's behaviour in a certain time, then they will be banned from this group.

[JeffRyan]

Even if it's not a full mmo, I think there's still scope for lots of unethical behavior. I'm just wondering how involved fd want to be. Hiring in game GMs will be costly.

I think things like scams (Jita-like) the large scale 'bank' robberies and whatever, people being mean, ganking, piracy, con jobs are fine and shouldn't be policed.

My main concern is that 'regular folks' will choose offline or to play only with friends and leave the main game to the eve type of madness. Which I'd like not to be the case.

[Penthux]

By the title question, I mean how permissive will frontier developments be in regards to player behavior?

A good example is EVE. In EVE even the meta game is cut throat. Players have been known to scam in game currency out of each other via the forums. The developers take a hands off approach.

With other multiplayer games the developers will intervene where they feel there is unethical behavior e.g. restoring scammed items and currency, punishing griefers with bans.

I expect Frontier Developments to have a strictly "unless you're breaking the rules you can go about your business and do what the hell you like" attitude. No restrictions on scamming or cheating other players out of their credits or belongings, or even their ship! (The chance would be a fine thing!) There will be, most likely, lots of players spamming Frontier with messages like "He killed me SIXTEEN TIMES in cold blood! STOP HIM! He's ruining my game " and I expect their pleas to fall on 'deaf ears'.

In Eve, if you thought the developers and CCP staff weren't in on the scams and corruption, you'd be naïve and totally wrong.

There's a point I'd like to make about scams. No scam I've ever come across was kept secret for very long. If players take time to read about the game (i.e. as on this forum) I'm sure there will be future threads and notices about the latest and greatest swindles in the universe. The same goes for high-risk areas and dangerous activities which will be broadcast far and wide for all to see and know about, I'm certain. I've fallen for loads of scams and tricks in my time. It's part of the learning curve we all have to go through.

The only time I'd expect Frontier to reimburse players with lost items/ships is due to unforeseen bugs and ONLY for that reason. Laggy Internet connections, drunk at the joystick, watching Coronation Street while flying your Cobra (etc.) do not constitute game bugs. Although, there will always be those who think they are entitled to have their ship replaced for free when they fly too close to that asteroid and _SPLAT_ (Ooops!)

Ignorance is one thing, dishonesty is another. Incidentally, Frontier are responsible for neither. That's totally up to the player to deal with. I hope Frontier do take a very hands-off approach when it comes to what is and what is not ethical in Elite: Dangerous. Some players will only be in the Elite universe for that very purpose/reason.

[JeffRyan]

I expect Frontier Developments to have a strictly "unless you're breaking the rules you can go about your business and do what the hell you like" attitude. No restrictions on scamming or cheating other players out of their credits or belongings, or even their ship! (The chance would be a fine thing!) There will be, most likely, lots of players spamming Frontier with messages like "He killed me SIXTEEN TIMES in cold blood! STOP HIM! He's ruining my game " and I expect their pleas to fall on 'deaf ears'.

In Eve, if you thought the developers and CCP staff weren't in on the scams and corruption, you'd be naïve and totally wrong.

There's a point I'd like to make about scams. No scam I've ever come across was kept secret for very long. If players take time to read about the game (i.e. as on this forum) I'm sure there will be future threads and notices about the latest and greatest swindles in the universe. The same goes for high-risk areas and dangerous activities which will be broadcast far and wide for all to see and know about, I'm certain. I've fallen for loads of scams and tricks in my time. It's part of the learning curve we all have to go through.

The only time I'd expect Frontier to reimburse players with lost items/ships is due to unforeseen bugs and ONLY for that reason. Laggy Internet connections, drunk at the joystick, watching Coronation Street while flying your Cobra (etc.) do not constitute game bugs. Although, there will always be those who think they are entitled to have their ship replaced for free when they fly too close to that asteroid and _SPLAT_ (Ooops!)

Ignorance is one thing, dishonesty is another. Incidentally, Frontier are responsible for neither. That's totally up to the player to deal with. I hope Frontier do take a very hands-off approach when it comes to what is and what is not ethical in Elite: Dangerous. Some players will only be in the Elite universe for that very purpose/reason.

What I was trying to articulate but the wife is trying to have a 'how do we organise the house around the baby' conversation whilst I was trying to respond to John... +1 Penthux

[Slawkenbergius]

I don't mind the idea scamming, but got the impression from EVE videos that it can quickly turn into spamming, which is something I could do without. Misleading ads on the marketplace would end up as being little more than an annoyance to sift through, and would add little to the game.

[ianw]

I expect Frontier Developments to have a strictly "unless you're breaking the rules you can go about your business and do what the hell you like" attitude. No restrictions on scamming or cheating other players out of their credits or belongings, or even their ship! (The chance would be a fine thing!)

Based on what they've said so far I can't see them intending to allow anything remotely like the worst examples of the oft referenced Eve experience.

How effective that will be - if that is their intention - remains to be seen...