Am I a criminal?

[DatBassie]

I've noticed that although I am not wanted, and merely shooting wanted ships at Nav Beacons, the Security Services are coming after me after a little while, without fail.

I cannot figure out why this is the case, but it is costing me several thousand credits in repairs and lost bounties... Just had a fight where I was killing a Cobra, who already got better halfway through the whole thing, and a Viper decided it was time I died. So I had to run, leaving the Cobra on 11% health and my Eagle on 15%.

Anyone else seeing this or have any clue as to what is happening?

 

[Achilles Maelstrom]

Probably some of the ships you were attacking belong to the systems factions? I have no clue to be honest.

 

[CMDR Cartwright]

You got to check the faction of your victims, if it's the same as the governing faction of the system that you are in, the cops will respond.

Otherwise if you only see a bounty after using the K-Warrant scanner then your victims are not wanted in that particular system and therefor you may get a bounty on yourself in return.

 

[Quietman]

I've noticed that although I am not wanted, and merely shooting wanted ships at Nav Beacons, the Security Services are coming after me after a little while, without fail.

I cannot figure out why this is the case, but it is costing me several thousand credits in repairs and lost bounties... Just had a fight where I was killing a Cobra, who already got better halfway through the whole thing, and a Viper decided it was time I died. So I had to run, leaving the Cobra on 11% health and my Eagle on 15%.

Anyone else seeing this or have any clue as to what is happening?

Yes, this is a regular event for my bounty hunting expeditions as well; practically all vessels affiliated with the local faction will turn red, but only one or two of the security ships will start attacking you, (and of course they are unattackable as they do not turn wanted).

I ignore the security ships, (they'll leave you alone if you get far enough away), or I SC out of the Nav Beacon/Resource Site and then immediately re-enter it. This resets the instance, i.e. it generates new vessels and no more agro.

Life as a bounty hunter is currently painful, inconsistent and a test of your will; I guess it's FD's way of separating the wheat from the chaff, or it's a work in progress.

 

[Quietman]

You got to check the faction of your victims, if it's the same as the governing faction of the system that you are in, the cops will respond.

The problem is, that it is completely inconsistent, i.e.

- Sometimes I can hunt for an hour in a Nav Beacon/Resource Site and even though the majority of the local faction vessels turn red, none of the security vessels attack; other times I am attacked by security in seconds of my first bounty kill.

- I have been simultaneously scanned by a security vessel that has given me the all clear and attacked by another security vessel that didn't even bother scanning me.

- Bodyguard/escort vessels will attack you if you are collecting a bounty within a certain distance of them, (as if you are attacking their client, even though you are not), and most of the time not turn wanted, (this one is particularly aggravating). On the odd occasion that they do turn wanted, as soon as their shields are gone, they turn and run for a few seconds and then come to a dead stand still and wait to be sitting duck'ed.

- If the wanted ship you are attacking is supposedly calling for local reinforcements/security vessels, then _some_ of these issues kind of make sense. But the reality is, (implementation bugs aside), that if a wanted felon calls the police, I guess 99 times out of 100 the police are going to apprehend the felon and thank the citizen who's trying to help.

 

[DatBassie]

Thanks for your answers, at least I know that is happening now.

Still seems a bit weird, they are wanted after all, but I will just move to Anarchy systems a bit more for the bounty hunting, I guess.

 

[Shads]

I just gave up shooting anything that wasn't shooting at me. I just could not figure out how all the wanted, hostile, fines worked.

 

[Quietman]

I just gave up shooting anything that wasn't shooting at me. I just could not figure out how all the wanted, hostile, fines worked.

I feel your frustration.

The real problem though is that a large percentage of the time you can't even defend yourself whilst you are being being shot at; you have no fines or bounties and have done nothing wrong apart from try to collect a bounty and the maniac, (not just security vessels), who's trying to shoot you up won't turned wanted.

If FD's idea is that you need to find non local bounties within a local faction space, or follow a bounty out of his local faction space until he enters a non local faction space/anarchy/etc, then bounty hunting is completely dead in the water.

I'm hopeful though that this is unfinished functionality, combined with buggy implementation and that they'll eventually make it a consistent and worthwhile profession.

 

[Hexen]

Thanks for your answers, at least I know that is happening now.

Still seems a bit weird, they are wanted after all, but I will just move to Anarchy systems a bit more for the bounty hunting, I guess.

Yeah, stirring troubles at Sobek now (Alliance/anarchy) and it's great! Just keep in mind that you will not get bounty for killing criminals in Anarchy systems. There's no police to record the crimes. If they wanted in other systems - it's okay and works. And there is a way to get bounty there if some ship attack vessel belonging to ruling faction in the anarchy system and it was witnessed by someone. Those I managed to cash in at anarchy port. Still kinda limited because most criminals I encounter does not yield any bounty at all.

Buuut... there's a lot of cool cargo dropping there. And anarchy ports often have black market Let's say it was rather profitable for me. Although what is 50K gain for a trader with tools at his/her disposal?

 

[Bamboocha]

False false false false false wrong, heresay and whatnot.

You DON'T need to check any faction.

If a ship is wanted, you shooting on it should NOT trigger any hostile response from the security. If it does, it only means they still haven't fixed this bug.

 

[DatBassie]

Yeah, stirring troubles at Sobek now (Alliance/anarchy) and it's great! Just keep in mind that you will not get bounty for killing criminals in Anarchy systems. There's no police to record the crimes. If they wanted in other systems - it's okay and works. And there is a way to get bounty there if some ship attack vessel belonging to ruling faction in the anarchy system and it was witnessed by someone. Those I managed to cash in at anarchy port. Still kinda limited because most criminals I encounter does not yield any bounty at all.

Buuut... there's a lot of cool cargo dropping there. And anarchy ports often have black market Let's say it was rather profitable for me. Although what is 50K gain for a trader with tools at his/her disposal?

Yeah, it's possible to work around it, but it's still pretty dumb.

False false false false false wrong, heresay and whatnot.

You DON'T need to check any faction.

If a ship is wanted, you shooting on it should NOT trigger any hostile response from the security. If it does, it only means they still haven't fixed this bug.

Never heard about this, I guess it is a bug. Didn't have it before, at least.

 

[Jack Booted Thug]

I hunt my bounties in anarchy systems. That way you avoid offending anyone.

 

[DatBassie]

Just got killed again, because apparently, everyone has friends!

How can ED expect us to do any bounty hunting when they make it this hard? And now I don't even get my bounty vouchers back when I die anymore! What is this crap?

 

[reaper7]

Life as a bounty hunter in ED sure is stacked against you.
Fines for shooting first and murder charges for killing wanted vessels. Hard to make a decent living.
2 hrs bounty hunting earned me 24k in cr, ok till I had to pay up around 30k in Fines and repairs.
Not very profitable at all. Still it was fun indeed.

 

[DatBassie]

Life as a bounty hunter in ED sure is stacked against you.
Fines for shooting first and murder charges for killing wanted vessels. Hard to make a decent living.
2 hrs bounty hunting earned me 24k in cr, ok till I had to pay up around 30k in Fines and repairs.
Not very profitable at all. Still it was fun indeed.

I guess it's just really buggy right now. It certainly sets the scene for pirates having a way easier life than most people want them to have (and than they should have).

 

[Belisarius]

At the moment the Kill Warrant Scanner is your biggest asset.

If you use the Kill Warrant Scanner in USS where you have a wanted ship together with System Authority Vessels and actively scan the wanted ship with it before attacking,
the System Authority Vessels won´t attack you (but rather, as soon as the KWS has finished scanning) attack the wanted ship on their own.

May be a workaround around buggy behavior ... but at least it is a workaround that works and allows you to kill wanted ships without ticking of the System Authority Vessels

 

[irongut]

Fines for shooting first and murder charges for killing wanted vessels. Hard to make a decent living.
2 hrs bounty hunting earned me 24k in cr, ok till I had to pay up around 30k in Fines and repairs.

Are you sure the fines were for shooting Wanted vessels? Did you wait for your scan to finish before firing? (standard id scan, not KWS) Because if so then something is very wrong and I'd file a ticket.

Bounty Hunting is my main income and the only time I get fines is when I accidentally shoot a Clean ship, usually one that gets in the way while I'm trying to kill a criminal. That is annoying but I'm getting better at avoiding it.

I do find that I get attcked by security and Clean vessels after a while but afaik that is a bug. The easiest workaround is to supercruise out of the site and then return.

 

[Whelp]

Never got a fine or anything for killing wanted ships, NPCs or players, and that's mainly what I've been doing since release. Are you sure you've scanned them before opening fire?

EDIT: also, it's easy to accidentally hit innocent bystanders, especially with gimballed weapons, particularly multicannons.
And if you start deploying mines or shooting dumbfire missiles at a NAV point... well, you'll get what's coming to you.