Open letter to Frontier

[Toxic_Waster]

Why should players resort to such dubious actions? Why can't we have the weekly tunnel between modes like black holes? Let's call this Black Friday.

 

[Roland2]

But there's all sorts of ways to grief you on a PvE server.

In the end the only way you prevent that happening is by removing the offending party's access to the server, whether Frontier or a player does that specific job is irrelevant.

And in fact I'd argue having a player manage the group and do it is much better since they can just give the player in question the finger if they complain, Frontier can't. If Frontier are responsible for policing a server then you can bet policing is gonna err on the side of warning and letting people continue.

I understand griefers gona grief, but why make it easy for them. Other then shooting and ramming, I know of no way for a player to kill another player. Any other "griefing" can be dealt with by simply changing instances, or going to solo to launch/ get away.

Your "way to prevent" doesn't prevent anything. Putting a murderer in jail, doesn't help the dead people at all.

 

[bamber]

Personally I'm surprised its taken so long.
.
At the end of the day Modbus is a private group its up to that group to monitor and police their group not FD

 

[bitstorm]

I understand griefers gona grief, but why make it easy for them. Other then shooting and ramming, I know of no way for a player to kill another player. Any other "griefing" can be dealt with by simply changing instances, or going to solo to launch/ get away.

Your "way to prevent" doesn't prevent anything. Putting a murderer in jail, doesn't help the dead people at all.

If a player in Mobius is attacked (and maybe killed) then it's not the end of the world.

I mean it's not *actually* like murder or anything, and let's be honest it's not even that big of a deal. Dude/lass get's kicked problem solved.

It's just not that serious that we need a whole new game mode sorted and enforced by Frontier. Players do the job fine if they have decent tools. And letting players decide means you end up with all sorts of variants on private server gaming, as I say Mobius isn't the only private group and their ruleset isn't the one and only ruleset outside of open.

The issue really is the tools, player don't have them and are unable to manage groups effectively. Even just banning a user from Mobius is a huge pita that takes around 20 odd minutes of messing about to do.

 

[Huros]

Unfortunately, not just the "PvP crowd", but FD as well.

From: ZacAntonaci_Frontier
"Hey guys,
It's really disappointing to see players actively griefing other players. The fact of the matter here is that Mobius is a private group where players decide to come together and play in a specific way. The idea that someone decides they want to be disruptive without any real reason or gain is a shame.
However, "griefing" in itself isn't against the rules. There is no evidence that I can see that suggests that the players in question altered the game in any way in order to gain an unfair advantage. In addition, groups are made in a way that allow players to join together and play in a way they want. However, it is the admins of those groups that manage which Commanders have access to the group and which do not.
It is something that David Braben and the developers are aware of though. Only recently I heard David answer a question on this subject in a community interview and I know that it's something that has/is considered by the developers, and I know that creating a friendly and enjoyable game experience is something that is taken very seriously.
I should also mention, the offending players have been removed from the Mobius group. I know this because the Mobius admins got in touch when there were some technical difficulties with managing their group permissions to remove these members from the groups. The members were successfully removed and the technical issues have been resolved.
On a personal level, I must say, on the most part we see community members taking part in PVP or roleplaying piracy in a way that works for everyone. If a trader is stopped and asked to drop their cargo, they feel better for the experience and not having to rebuy their ship - That player is more likely to continue to trade. The pirate can then plunder another day.
It isn’t piracy if a player deliberately tries to ruin another player’s experience. It is unfortunate to see players trying and taking pride in this kind of experience."

Based on: "However, "griefing" in itself isn't against the rules. There is no evidence that I can see that suggests that the players in question altered the game in any way in order to gain an unfair advantage. In addition, groups are made in a way that allow players to join together and play in a way they want. However, it is the admins of those groups that manage which Commanders have access to the group and which do not."

Its Mobius' fault, not FD's (according to FD).

Sorry Zac, but that is a hand wringing cop out. Nice spin.

 

[[VR]tailgunner30uk]

This is the exact stance that CCP take to "griefing" in Eve online. As long as you're not exploiting, anything goes. If that really is Frontier's stance on the matter, then it's case closed and everybody will just have to live with it. Personally I'm used to it, I played Eve for over 10 years, I've seen the best and worst aspects of PvP in that time and in all honesty, the positives far outweigh the negatives in my opinion.

In so far as I am aware, and please correctly if I am wrong. Eve does not have private groups, everyone plays in open. They do have high, medium and low security areas with an apparently effective, up to a point, security system. But players cannot "be elsewhere" in the game. Mobius is a private group with specific honour-based rules that the player agrees to upon requesting to join. There is no equivalence here at all. The player group that decided to infiltrate Mobius did so by lying about their intentions. They had to do this as, if they had told the truth, their application would have been refused.

 

[Huros]

I think it is the fact that FDEV gave SDC a big front and centre spot light recently. They are obviously duping everyone not just Mobeus FD have been scammed by them too and now have egg on their face. Well shadow server time for the whole group me thinks.

 

[[VR]tailgunner30uk]

If a player in Mobius is attacked (and maybe killed) then it's not the end of the world.

I mean it's not *actually* like murder or anything, and let's be honest it's not even that big of a deal. Dude/lass get's kicked problem solved.

You are correct, but, it is another disgruntled player who will make his opinion clear, here and in other forums, such as Steam and on Reddit. How do you think this will affect the perceptions of potential future customers?

 

[bitstorm]

I think it is the fact that FDEV gave SDC a big front and centre spot light recently. They are obviously duping everyone not just Mobeus FD have been scammed by them too and now have egg on their face. Well shadow server time for the whole group me thinks.

Just feel like I'm labouring the point here but..

I honestly don't feel it's Frontier's job to police private groups, it is however Frontier's job to provide users with the tools to police groups.

This is where Frontier have failed.

The Mobius group cannot even be loaded anymore, it 500s.

And even if it did load, imagine scrolling through a list of 20,000 unsorted CMDR names trying to find the one single user you need to ban.

It's totally unusable, Mr Mobius does an amazing (and thankless) job of managing Mobius group. I would have chucked it in ages ago out of frustration.

 

[Roland2]

If a player in Mobius is attacked (and maybe killed) then it's not the end of the world.

I mean it's not *actually* like murder or anything, and let's be honest it's not even that big of a deal. Dude/lass get's kicked problem solved.

It's just not that serious that we need a whole new game mode sorted and enforced by Frontier. Players do the job fine if they have decent tools. And letting players decide means you end up with all sorts of variants on private server gaming, as I say Mobius isn't the only private server and thier ruleset isn't the one and only ruleset outside of open.

The issue really is the tools, player don't have them and are unable to manage groups effectively. Even just banning a user from Mobius is a huge pita that takes around 20 odd minutes of messing about to do.

To me, yes, it is like murder, and it is a big deal. I understand you don't feel that way, so we can agree to disagree.

As for weather FD or a Group Leader manages "the group", I have no problem with Group Leaders having the tools to set rules, kick people or whatever. At the same time, if a player can't shoot another player, there is no reason for the Group Leader to do anything other then setting a setting when they set up the group. You don't need to take 20 minutes to ban someone for shooting a player, if they can't shoot a player.

 

[MottiKhan]

You are correct, but, it is another disgruntled player who will make his opinion clear, here and in other forums, such as Steam and on Reddit. How do you think this will affect the perceptions of potential future customers?

That's particularly disturbing since it appears on the surface that FD has given tacit approval to SDC and their actions. I, for one, won't defend FD or SDC in this.

 

[Sandmann]

Again: it did happen before. Numerous times.

I was referring to an "invasion" by an organised group. As far as I know till now it's just been individuals?

Just shake your head and move on.

Yup. I'd have liked to have seen stronger condemnation from FD than "unfortunate" though... let's say that was an "unfortunate" choice of response from them.

 

[eza]

To play devil's advocate (because I don't agree with the actions of these infiltrators): private groups are meant to be as their name suggests - private.
If you join a private group whose owner lets anyone in then it's not a private group any more, and this sort of thing can happen.

Try joining a private group with people you actually know and this won't happen.

 

[Sandmann]

I can imagine two things that can be done by FD.

First, significantly increasing the repercussions of needles PVP kills, even attacks. By needless, I mean clean targets not pledged to a power. In PP enemy encounters and towards wanted targets nothing needs to be changed. The repercussions need to be tied to the membership of the pilots federation so NPC kills won't get affected lorewise.

There's a big thread about this currently with some ideas from Sandro about increased consequences. If it happens as suggested it looks like it might be good. I'm not holding my breath, just slightly hopeful.

Second, giving proper group management tools to the players so they can assign moderators and admins, who can warn, temp ban and perma-ban players from their group. Some functions can of course be automated like flagging and warning a player who attacks another in a PVE group.

I don't think any of these things are too complicated in terms of coding, repercussions only need tweaking some parameters. Group management tools, well, they are pretty commonplace in games already. The only difficulty is coming up with the PK penalties in an efficient and non game breaking way.

As Sandro said in that thread I referred to there's no changes they can make in the game that are trivial - all of them take lots of work and some just can't be done. Remember that private groups like mobius are still playing in the same galaxy, on the same single server, and there's no centralised server system. Sure they could do it, but it's a cost vs gain thing and those sort of changes at a fundamental level of code could easily break as much as they fix.

 

[kofeyh]

This is amusing and to be expected. I'm sorry for any loss. But to not expect this is neivity at it's worst.

An organised group going to the considerable effort of stealth invading a group and then enacting a timed event; good on 'em. I'm sure Frontier are both equally overjoyed (because it's actually a half-decent effort) and a little annoyed (because they ended up lumped with partially having to support mobius).

But really, this is a bit funny because the response has always, always been gloating Mobius members claiming their way was the best way. I'm hardly surprised that didn't sit well with hardcore PVPers.

PVE is not part of ED at this time; private groups still allow inter-commander combat, so it's going to happen. Frontier may add that down the line. Mobius is important, but not representative of the entire community. I'm sure frontier will consider if PVE is actually something they wish to persue in due course.

 

[Roland2]

To play devil's advocate (because I don't agree with the actions of these infiltrators): private groups are meant to be as their name suggests - private.
If you join a private group whose owner lets anyone in then it's not a private group any more, and this sort of thing can happen.

Try joining a private group with people you actually know and this won't happen.

What if you don't know anybody? Be a hermit, or PvP fodder? PvE groups are formed because people want to play the "Massive Multiplayer" PvE game they bought.

 

[DanaM]

Disappointing to be honest. PvEers constantly get told to go play in solo or möbius like open is some exclusive club. Then some idiots come along and spoil even that to get their kicks. Then when they complain about being griefed in a mode they get told to play in, the answer from some is they should police it themselves better. It seems the PvP crowd have no respect for PvEers choice of play style and think of nothing but themselves.

The answer is not giving 1 person tools to run a group 20 thousand plus players. That's the lazy way that serves nothing more than make PvPers feel like their mode is special. The answer is provide a proper PvE game mode.

Hopefully despite what FD said, they are taking the problem more seriously.

OK. Suggestions?
I understand not wanting to deal with griefers. I left Open after a Cmdr blew up my type 6 and haven't been back.....yet. I've been happy in Solo. If I wanted to play with other decent people, there are Private Groups available. I even have my own. Seems like FD has given us the tools. You want something more, right? What would you like, specifically?

BTW, I'll be returning to Open soon in an A-rated FDL with hate for griefers in my heart and vengeance on my mind. What could be more fun, more satisfying than killing griefers? Well, I'll tell you.....cooperating with other like minded people to kill griefers. So, anybody want to wing up and show some griefers what real grief is? I am at your service. I also could take my Anaconda, if other people want to do the chasing.

 

[New Duke]

Would be interesting to know how Mobius himself reacted to this, given it's his baby and he approves all users. Hopefully he's removed them all from the group and made a note of their names in case they try to join again. FD does have a habit of promoting griefer groups. Remember how much attention they gave Code last year?

FD's response may have struck a nerve on here because they rarely seem genuinely bothered, unless it involves selling something. I don't believe anyone at FD actually plays the game for fun which explains why they don't really care.

EDIT: By that I mean FD not creating their own PVE mode for people how want to socialise but don't want to be unfairly gang ****ed. The invasion shows that you either play with the psychopaths or you go solo and that's not conducive to keeping players... which this game badly needs. FD should never have left it to the community to self manage... hence them not really caring.

 

[Huros]

This whole thing would be a non issue if FDev had not put these guys up on s pedestal.

 

[sqzbox1]

Its Mobius' fault, not FD's (according to FD).

Seriously? Come on, it's nobody's fault except the morons from SDC. They tried a little subversion, had a limited success until banned, and now it is all over. What's the big deal?

We live in a world of "innocent until proven guilty" and Mobius accepts members on that basis. So there is a little flurry of activity from the insurgent and then they are banned. All proper and correct. I really fail to see why all this emotionalism is happening here.

Personally, and of course this is just my opinion, I think FD opened Pandora's Box when they started to get involved in player activities. Zac and Ed and FD in general should have kept a healthy distance from all that stuff, and address any issues that they feel need addressing at a game level, quietly and in the background. Such as better tools for group management, consequences in-game for gankers such as restricted port access, and so on.

And finally, why the hate for the Mobius group? The assumptions being stated here are ludicrous and completely without foundation. I suspect hidden agendas. Were you the SDC members in question? Or a supporter of that group of griefers perhaps? Anyway, it's simply a case of numbers - because the group is so large then of course all the different type of players are going to be represented there, including the rage-quitters. So what? I think the sheer size of the group demonstrates its success and I also think congratulations are due to Mobius for providing what is clearly a much-wanted group, and for the dedication he shows to the running of the group. Oh, and BTW, he is a very good artist as well. Thank you Mr Mobius.