Shooting a clean ship that has report crimes off should disable the shooter's own crime reports temporarily

[Screemonster]

At present, if a clean ship has report crimes off, an attacker can shoot at them with impunity (as intended), but if the attacker has crime reporting turned on the defender will incur a bounty for returning fire. This has caused complications and controversy in PvP situations for... honestly as long as the game has been out, with various etiquette arguments about whether you should have crimes off or on. With the addition of bounty hunter and assassin mission wrinkles for odyssey missions - hostile ships that do not spawn with bounties - turning crimes off when doing PvE puts you at an incredible disadvantage as you'll be pursued by extremely persistent and hostile NPCs without the option to just turn around and blow them away.

It's also impossible to tell if the person you're fighting has crime reporting on, which against another players allows one to be extremely provocative without the other player knowing whether they'll be committing a crime if they shoot you or not.

I propose the following:

• If you perform an action that would incur a bounty if the victim had crimes enabled, your own crime report toggle automatically (and immediately) deactivates until your next hyperspace jump.
• Clean ships with report crimes turned off should be marked "LAWLESS", indicating that you can attack without legal consequences but don't expect backup if they return fire.
• Being the aggressor in an interdiction against a clean ship (crime reports enabled or otherwise) should also disable your link.
• Naturally, all the above apply to NPC crime reporting too for those situations where an otherwise clean NPC is aggressive.

This would allow players to fly with crime reporting off and still have the legal option to deal with the occasional clean NPC that causes them trouble (without police interference) while also offering a way to signal to other players via the HUD readout that you're up for a scrap.

 

[metatheurgist]

If the attacker has report crimes on, and they attack a clean ship, do they not get a bounty? Or is it just a fine now? I'd think the intent would be that the attacker makes themselves a valid target by committing a crime.

 

[Screemonster]

If the attacker has report crimes on, and they attack a clean ship, do they not get a bounty? Or is it just a fine now? I'd think the intent would be that the attacker makes themselves a valid target by committing a crime.

Currently, if the attacker has report crimes on and the victim does not, nothing happens to the attacker but the victim becomes wanted if they return fire.

 

[aRJay]

I understand the reasons for the suggestion but at first glance it feels a very game like mechanic given that we can’t tell the state of someone else’s report crimes option.

 

[metatheurgist]

Currently, if the attacker has report crimes on and the victim does not, nothing happens to the attacker but the victim becomes wanted if they return fire.

That seems wrong to me. Report crimes should be a 2 way street.

 

[BackToTheMud]

With how you describe your problem it seem a lot easier to just manually turn rapport crimes off when you're doing consensual PvP, i.e duells or shenanigans.

 

[Screemonster]

With how you describe your problem it seem a lot easier to just manually turn rapport crimes off when you're doing consensual PvP, i.e duells or shenanigans.

The issue is more that it has a very long timer on turning it back on, so if you get caught with it turned off then you have to wait a long time for it to re-enable during which time an attacker can just keep shooting you.

Ideally I'd have it only turned on against people who have it turned on themselves

 

[BackToTheMud]

The issue is more that it has a very long timer on turning it back on, so if you get caught with it turned off then you have to wait a long time for it to re-enable during which time an attacker can just keep shooting you.

Ideally I'd have it only turned on against people who have it turned on themselves

Isn't it a 10 sec delay?
Regardless, you're the one deciding to not make use of the games justice system; that should come with some drawbacks. And with how utterly ineffective that legal system is to detere against preforming criminal acts, what you're complaining about is barely an inconvenience.

 

[Screemonster]

Isn't it a 10 sec delay?
Regardless, you're the one deciding to not make use of the games justice system; that should come with some drawbacks. And with how utterly ineffective that legal system is to detere against preforming criminal acts, what you're complaining about is barely an inconvenience.

I didn't know simple quality-of-life features needed to be justified with an endless sneering debate.

 

[Scimitar101]

It's mindblowing that this still isn't a thing, we've been asking to get the issue of abusing crimes on/off fixed for like 8 years at this point but they don't seem to care at all.

This game absolutely NEEDS to display a HUD indicator under other playerships that have their crimes off, and there absolutely NEEDS to be some form of a "self defence" protection that prevents you from getting wanted when you get attacked first but you had crimes off, like Scree suggests.

But as said, we've been asking for this since almost release. They don't give a damn.

 

[Screemonster]

It's mindblowing that this still isn't a thing, we've been asking to get the issue of abusing crimes on/off fixed for like 8 years at this point but they don't seem to care at all.

This game absolutely NEEDS to display a HUD indicator under other playerships that have their crimes off, and there absolutely NEEDS to be some form of a "self defence" protection that prevents you from getting wanted when you get attacked first but you had crimes off, like Scree suggests.

But as said, we've been asking for this since almost release. They don't give a damn.

to be fair, they did add the 10 second delay on the toggle (with a very small-text hud warning) specifically to avoid an underhanded trick where people would challenge others to a 1v1 and then quickly flip crimes on, usually when they were losing. Unfortunately there's no indication if they started with crimes on, which means historically PvP groups have had to seek out anarchist or uninhabited systems to avoid unnecessary complications.

Personally I have crimes on for PvE, but since the 10 second delay also applies to turning them off as well, it kinda feels dirty to interdict another player to do the joke pirate thing - especially in archon systems with the archon bonus where I can't possibly be wanted - only for them to get wanted if they fight back. (okay it's a little funny and it only costs them 200 extra credits and a trip to the prison ship, but c'mon, it should be legal for them to shoot me)

 

[zeta]

Isn't it a 10 sec delay?
Regardless, you're the one deciding to not make use of the games justice system; that should come with some drawbacks. And with how utterly ineffective that legal system is to detere against preforming criminal acts, what you're complaining about is barely an inconvenience.

Well, how about 'I don't want to be inconvenienced in what I percieve as a poor design choice' ?

I have been repeatedly in this situation where a player clearly abuses this design.

I welcome consentual or organic pvp encounters, I have crimes off, I return fire and now I am wanted.

I simply leave the instance (won't pvp with someone who does this) then within minutes get into another pvp fight, I die and find myself 50Ly away. That's fine in a krait or pm2 but not cool in an fdl when I have 30 minutes to play.

Another situation is when I respawn and suddenly have crimes turned on even though I had it off (it's a bug I think). At least if I were the aggressor, now the other player is not inconvenienced.

The current rules are not set in stone, can be changed and perhaps should be changed. It is definitely worth FD's consideration imo.