System & faction banners

monr0e

M
There's a number of large open-world games that support banners or announcements in certain areas. I've been considering possible ways to accomplish this, particularly when factions want to announce their presence in a given system.

My current idea is to use an alt, sit it in normal space in a sidey, and built a bot to make system chats. Obviously, whilst this isnt necessarily game-breaking behaviour, it's technically against ToS. I want to consider maybe establishing a set number of parameters for doing this - for example, no programmable motion or programatically moving the ship or firing weapons. Ideally, I'd like the possibility of adding system announcements by the controlling faction into the game, but this is certainly down the line. For now, other than the obvious ToS issue, is there a game-moral opposition to this sort of bot?
 

Go'Gen

Go'Gen
... or ask FDevs to implement faction-player-owned-system-probes-bought-for-arx which would emit a message upon your arrival in that system + every 60 minutes and could be scanned for text version (and maybe some low grade data as well).
 

monr0e

M
The idea is that it's a non-interactive system chat - like the ceremonial comms or the funeral comms. The faction would have to be present in-system, and would need to have a certain level of influence or be involved in war or election states. Making it necessary for the player to interact with would mean players would inevitably miss out on messages. This is kind of a follow-on from this reddit post I made the other day: https://redd.it/hljwfs
 

Strangepork

Strangepork
We are not allowed this sort of stuff because of swearing and the like ^^

Also It's not our galaxy or game for that matter, it belongs to the FDuf.
 

Florenus

Florenus
monr0e said:
For now, other than the obvious ToS issue, is there a game-moral opposition to this sort of bot?
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Yes, I don't care what kind of announcement you might want to make and I don't wish to see it.
If you want to spam system chat, I don't give &&$%& about that, because I have it turned off, exactly because I don't like the idea of random people announcing random crap in my game.
For that reason I don't like the idea of introducing something like this in game (player announcement system).
You don't need to announce faction presence- it's visible in various screens in game. Everything that's gameplay related can be (or should be) learned by studying system map, or reading station services boards. No need for personally written declarations.
Whatever else you have to say - say it to me personally if you need to.
 

monr0e

M
Florenus said:
Yes, I don't care what kind of announcement you might want to make and I don't wish to see it...
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May I ask, did you read the attached reddit thread in my second comment? If you're in system and chats are either not in your tab or you don't necessarily notice them until it's too late, you're going to be pretty salty if I blow up your PvE cobra. I'm generally just after a way to inform players that a given system might be hazardous to them. It's not about spamming chat, persay, nor about announcing a factions presence. It's about announcing that a faction is operating and conducting security patrols in that system. Right now, we rely on direct chats to inform a player of the reasons why they are being pulled over and/or asked to leave a system and it's simply not effective enough. The language barrier probably doesn't help, either, but that's another bridge to cross.

Bottom Hat said:
Someone would just shoot down your bot-ship.
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Not necessarily. If that ship is sat in a system long-term, the wake either disappears or becomes inaccessible to ships without a scanner. However, shooting down the bot ship would be a valid part of BGS work (including both PvE and PvP), so I have no real compunctions about it. Besides, it's a sidey - it can be respawned like a bunny in a top hat.

john willi said:
We are not allowed this sort of stuff because of swearing and the like ^^

Also It's not our galaxy or game for that matter, it belongs to the FDuf.
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Profanity filter fixes that.
Regarding ownership, I don't think that necessarily changes anything - we are the ones who play it, and this is a concerted effort to improve the experience for new players.
 
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Florenus

Florenus
monr0e said:
May I ask, did you read the attached reddit thread in my second comment? If you're in system and chats are either not in your tab or you don't necessarily notice them until it's too late, you're going to be pretty salty if I blow up your PvE cobra. I'm generally just after a way to inform players that a given system might be hazardous to them. It's not about spamming chat, persay, nor about announcing a factions presence. It's about announcing that a faction is operating and conducting security patrols in that system. Right now, we rely on direct chats to inform a player of the reasons why they are being pulled over and/or asked to leave a system and it's simply not effective enough. The language barrier probably doesn't help, either, but that's another bridge to cross.
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If you're going to interdict some ship, you can go all the way and explain why then. If you need to set up a bot on an alt account in normal space, then I assume you're going to spam system chat with repeating messages every few minutes. Sounds annoying. Especially that system chat works also if people are in Solo or PG and you really don't need to warn those players.
If pasting some prepared warning in chat window when needed doesn't work for you, because people don't notice, understand, or care, spamming some bot messages will not work either.
 

monr0e

M
Florenus said:
...people don't notice, understand, or care, spamming some bot messages will not work either.
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This is part of an end-goal, really. The idea is to eventually be able to implement some sort of banner system that just gently ticks over somewhere noticeable, but not too imposing. In order to do that, though, we need to demonstrate the usefulness of system messages, which is really the motivation behind this idea.
 

Sapyx

Sapyx
monr0e said:
It's about announcing that a faction is operating and conducting security patrols in that system.
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I reject the belief that players have any right to speak for, or unilaterally act on behalf of, any faction. Your connection with "your faction" does not exist anywhere except in your mind. If the faction isn't paying you to do these things (and they're not, because such missions are not currently implemented), then as far as the game (and the faction) is concerned, you're just a bunch of thugs randomly pulling people over for no reason.

Example: I can unilaterally claim to speak for the Red Rebels of System X. But in my roleplay, the Red Rebels have decided that being a bunch of aggressive imperialist conquerors is something they don't want to do or be any more, so they need help in handing control of the star system back to the proper Federal, Imperial or Alliance authorities and then expelling themselves from every star system they have expanded into. My Red Rebels system banners would say this.

Now, actual supporters of the Red Rebels might object to my speaking on behalf of "their" faction like this. But who is right, and who gets to decide who is right, and therefore gets their banners placed in the system? Neither of us have any in-game connection with the faction.

At best, you might get squadron banners, as squadrons are clearly organized with a membership and with designated leaders who can claim authority to speak for the squadron. But then you'd have to have some way of deciding where and how such banners are allowed to be placed, since squadrons don't have a "presence" anywhere except perhaps on player carriers.
 

monr0e

M
Sapyx said:
I reject the belief that players have any right to speak for, or unilaterally act on behalf of, any faction. Your connection with "your faction" does not exist anywhere except in your mind...
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Well, no. It's role play. But that's precisely the point of Player Minor Factions. We, as a squadron, represent the non-npc element of a faction, and have a direct influence over how it expands, what happens with regards to it's level of influence, etcera. The same can be said of powerplay - the sum received even for hauling merits is pretty paltry, it's all just role play. It doesn't change the fact that we perform operations and take actions in the name of that faction or that power. Hell, look at those of us (myself included) who patrol HQ systems or expansion targets - we don't get paid in credits, we don't get any special rewards beyond a powerplay module, we don't even get recognition. Nothing like Eve, but we still do it because in doing so we create content and interaction with the game.
 

ebbrell

ebbrell
this would be nice. yes please. when a player faction is applied for one would be submitted.
as long as the image isnt too large the clients should be able to download it while we play from the server.... should you come in contact with a ship with the image etc.
 
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