Should one stray shot be a death sentence?

andrewg_oz

andrewg_oz
OK, this happened last night at the Arque CG and I'm still pretty salty about it, so here goes...

I was in my Vulture quietly blasting pirates. At one point I was scanning nearby NPCs looking for "wanted" ones when I clicked on a clean NPC and for some reason my trigger finger twitched. [sour]

That one shot got me a 200cr bounty and a "wanted" myself. I immediately pointed away, retracted weapons, hit boost, and started charging the FSD. I had no trouble getting away and was rather angry at myself for the next 10-20 minutes while I waited for the bounty to expire and to cash in the bounties I'd collected and pay the fine. I've only got an hour or two to play each weeknight, so this was a relatively large chunk wasted. Still, it could have been worse...

...which is what happened. I returned to the nav beacon and started hunting again. I eventually found myself in a fight with a pirate a few hundred metres away from me. No other ships in sight in front of me. Suddenly an NPC flew right in front of my ship - so close it filled the view in front of me and was gone again before I could react. But not before my lasers had got me another 200cr bounty.

This time the outcome was quite different. I did the same thing: point away, retract weapons, boost, and hit the FSD. At the same time about five or six nearby NPCs stopped whatever they were doing and immediately started to pile onto me. My shields that were already low collapsed, shortly followed by my thrusters. The inevitable 1Mcr rebuy appeared in due course. Over the last two nights I'd collected a total of about 800Kcr, so if it wasn't for the bonus CG credits, I'd have wasted more than two entire nights of game time. All because an NPC flew in front of me.

For the first incident, yes, I made a mistake. I targeted a clean ship and shot it. My bad. Bounty? Not unreasonable.

For the second incident, as far as I'm concerned, *I* didn't make a mistake - the NPC did, but I got to carry the can. I didn't target the NPC, they flew into my lasers. So close, there was no way for me to see them before they were in front of me.

Wiped out for a 200cr bounty. Seriously! 200cr? Offences of that level should be fines, not bounties. I would have no problem with hitting a targeted clean ship being a significant bounty more than 200cr, but hitting an untargeted ship just once, should not result in a bounty and then the uber-aggressiveness of NPC bounty hunters.

I know it's called "Elite:Dangerous", but this is just ridiculous.
 

Mohrgan

Mohrgan
Yeah, I think the friendly fire mechanic is working as it should. There is a good deal of lee-way in the system. You, unfortunately, ran afoul of having the security vessel targeted. If you hadn't you wouldn't have gotten the bounty.

Just as soon as you get the warning for being wanted, you have to exit. Pronto. Once you can jump out, you have a 6 - 10 min time out. Then the bounty converts into a small fine.

As a matter of fact, I am sitting out a time out as I type this. It's all for the safety of the authority guy who risk their lives to keep us safe, after all.
 

Heater

Heater
I think it needs to be looked at bit more, as there are a few issues with mines also, If you drop mines with the target selected and the cops drop in and hit one of the mines, guess what.... yep you are wanted for it (In my case it killed him, as he hit a shock mine and spun off into the others)..... Looked cool but cost me 20k and 7 days of staying out of that system.
 

Tin Actual

T
Yeah, the 200cr death sentence is crap. I'd like a tiny bit of leeway with the first scratch costing 200 cr, but folks will leave you alone. If you keep blasting for a total of 2 seconds it ramps up to 1000cr and then it's the death sentence.

Too many times I've been in a dogfight with a wanted ship only to have an anaconda pass 50m in front on me while I'm actively firing away. 200cr notice pops up and I gotta run away all while the system defense ship is causing thousands of credits of damage to my hull.
 

ForeverN00b

ForeverN00b
OP, sorry for the loss. It happens to almost all of us. If you get a 200 cr stray shot bounty, go to a neighboring system and wait 10 mins for the bounty to time out. It's not worth it to try and bounty hunt when other bounty hunters (and cops) are trying to kill you.
 
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24601

24601
What are the rules with bounty hunting? I normally steal from the cops but this time I didn't, I watched these two wanted ships slug it out and waited until one of them lost shields and 50% hull and started firing.
I then became wanted with a 500cr bounty.... I ran back to a station wanting to pay it, I couldn't :-/ The bounty counted down to zero then side something like On H-Jump I think???

Jumped out bounty GONE! :)
 

thearmysredneck

T
I'd like the damage threshold to be looked at a bit, I've had a few times this happened. More inconvenience than anything with one exception. That would mines. I'm not sure how to deal with those but as posted above, those are an issue.
 

Iain L

Iain L
My usual trick is not properly waiting until it actually says WANTED with them targeted before opening fire on a ship currently taking a pounding from the cops; an unfortunate side-effect of having not long made the switch from gimbals to fixed, and so actually having people targeted feels less important.

But keeping an eye on traffic wandering into my beam is something I realised was an issue fairly early on; you need to maintain fire discipline. Particularly when, as mentioned, you've gone to fixed lasers and so might hit that other ship behind your intended target.

There -is- a bit of leeway, I understand, just not the one that lets you get away with shots from the Class 3 weapons on your Vulture...
 
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ForeverN00b

ForeverN00b
24601 said:
What are the rules with bounty hunting? I normally steal from the cops but this time I didn't, I watched these two wanted ships slug it out and waited until one of them lost shields and 50% hull and started firing.
I then became wanted with a 500cr bounty.... I ran back to a station wanting to pay it, I couldn't :-/ The bounty counted down to zero then side something like On H-Jump I think???

Jumped out bounty GONE! :)
Click to expand...

Are you sure both ships were wanted? Wanted NPCs fight cops (and clean miners, and bounty hunters) but not each other. You might have picked on the wrong ship....there are NPC bounty hunters in res sites.
 

Codger

Codger
It's a bit harsh. So is death for loitering. It doesn't appear FD plans to change either one. It does give you another reason to be careful where you shoot :)

Programming wise I can't think of any way the game could easily tell that you didn't mean to shoot him. It can't read your mind.
 

mandork

M
That's not as bad as the time where I saw a ship being tailed and shot by another ship, so I figured "hey, one of them has to be bad, right?" I scan the victim's ship to find that he's innocent, so I open fire on the aggressor (a cobra opening up on a type 9) as I'm scanning him. I receive a bounty as the scan finishes and I learn the cobra is wanted. I'm then promptly killed by a wing of 5 combat vessels. Rip millions of credits.
 

Cliché

Cliché
Tin Actual said:
Yeah, the 200cr death sentence is crap. I'd like a tiny bit of leeway with the first scratch costing 200 cr, but folks will leave you alone. If you keep blasting for a total of 2 seconds it ramps up to 1000cr and then it's the death sentence.
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I like this idea, although maybe and extra scale, where only one or two ships attack for minor damage, and they don't all pounce on you until you do some serious damage or blow someone up, even if it was an accident (honest, officer, I thought he was wanted).

Regardless, there shouldn't be a feeding frenzy for somebody with a 200 cr bounty. I certainly don't attack ships with small bounties, as I assume they are in the same situation. And why is it that when there is a ship with a 200 cr bounty on it, it usually only has one security vessel shooting at it - not every ship in the system?
 

Deleted member 115407

D
I think the mechanic is perfectly acceptable. Practicing trigger discipline, knowing what's downrange, and maintaining situational awareness are all important.

That first encounter was not an accident, it was an act of negligence. The second was both yours and the NPC's fault.

A nav beacon is, to me, a terrible place to hunt because it's packed with all kinds of opportunities for things to go poorly. Res sites are slightly better. Combat zones are excellent (and pretty forgiving). For the safest bounty hunting experience, stalk the shipping lanes with an FSD interdictor.

BTW, having an out of sector bounty can help out with the latter suggestion, as it brings a lot of heat down on you in SC. You can keep crimes report on and when the cops show up, they'll just focus on the guy who shot at you. So you get bounties claims for being the hunter, and bounty claims for being the hunted.
 

JetsonRING

JetsonRING
andrewg_oz said:
OK, this happened last night at the Arque CG and I'm still pretty salty about it, so here goes...

I was in my Vulture quietly blasting pirates. At one point I was scanning nearby NPCs looking for "wanted" ones when I clicked on a clean NPC and for some reason my trigger finger twitched. [sour]

That one shot got me a 200cr bounty and a "wanted" myself. I immediately pointed away, retracted weapons, hit boost, and started charging the FSD. I had no trouble getting away and was rather angry at myself for the next 10-20 minutes while I waited for the bounty to expire and to cash in the bounties I'd collected and pay the fine. I've only got an hour or two to play each weeknight, so this was a relatively large chunk wasted. Still, it could have been worse...

...which is what happened. I returned to the nav beacon and started hunting again. I eventually found myself in a fight with a pirate a few hundred metres away from me. No other ships in sight in front of me. Suddenly an NPC flew right in front of my ship - so close it filled the view in front of me and was gone again before I could react. But not before my lasers had got me another 200cr bounty.

This time the outcome was quite different. I did the same thing: point away, retract weapons, boost, and hit the FSD. At the same time about five or six nearby NPCs stopped whatever they were doing and immediately started to pile onto me. My shields that were already low collapsed, shortly followed by my thrusters. The inevitable 1Mcr rebuy appeared in due course. Over the last two nights I'd collected a total of about 800Kcr, so if it wasn't for the bonus CG credits, I'd have wasted more than two entire nights of game time. All because an NPC flew in front of me.

For the first incident, yes, I made a mistake. I targeted a clean ship and shot it. My bad. Bounty? Not unreasonable.

For the second incident, as far as I'm concerned, *I* didn't make a mistake - the NPC did, but I got to carry the can. I didn't target the NPC, they flew into my lasers. So close, there was no way for me to see them before they were in front of me.

Wiped out for a 200cr bounty. Seriously! 200cr? Offences of that level should be fines, not bounties. I would have no problem with hitting a targeted clean ship being a significant bounty more than 200cr, but hitting an untargeted ship just once, should not result in a bounty and then the uber-aggressiveness of NPC bounty hunters.

I know it's called "Elite:Dangerous", but this is just ridiculous.
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[cry] Let's cry in our beers together: I was in a 300+ million credit A-rated Anaconda, in a firefight when a fed cop flew across my line of fire and absorbed a hit. I didn't shoot at him, he didn't die, dumbass just ran into a cannon round. Half a dozen cops turned on me and burned me down in seconds.

It isn't fair, life isn't fair, but I bet you will be REALLY careful who you shoot at from now on. I am!
 

WreckWren

W
Lethal responses for sub-1k bounties were stupid and always will be stupid. The responses of the AI would be reasonable if the AI didn't almost deliberately fly in front of you as it scrambles to comprehend more than one dimension.
 
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Bzek

B
My problem is not with the system of bounties itself, but the way that the target prioritization for NPC is skewed to target the players.

As an example, NPCs are firing away at a High-Bounty Anaconda, you are assisting. By mistake you hit a miner that got in the way, you get a 200cr bounty. Suddenly, it is like an APB goes out that taking you out is the highest priority ever. All NPCs ignore everything else and just go after you like you were public enemy #1.

That is what I really hate about the friendly-fire bounty system.


EDIT: Personally agree though. Sub-1000cr it should be fines, never bounties.
 
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Iain L

Iain L
Cliché said:
Regardless, there shouldn't be a feeding frenzy for somebody with a 200 cr bounty. I certainly don't attack ships with small bounties, as I assume they are in the same situation.
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I've seen a few people say this. But I've never seen what the bounty size is for a ship before I've made them go pop; is it in a menu somewhere?
 

Cliché

Cliché
Iain L said:
I've seen a few people say this. But I've never seen what the bounty size is for a ship before I've made them go pop; is it in a menu somewhere?
Click to expand...
Yeah, on the contacts tab on the nav panel.

I should add that I always check the bounty for role playing purposes.
 
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