The "Friendly Fire" Issue

[Morbad]

Actually it's more than a few. Seems like 50/50 to me from all the posts on this I've read.

Most people aren't on the forums, and most of those who are on the forums are here because they have a complaint.

 

[MartinW]

It was closer to 5 than 2.

The second incident on Mixxi's video, where he died to a collision was something that should be altered. Collisions between ships should not be desirable, and in principle, collisions between equal mass ships should result in severe damage to or destruction of both. You have to make a concession to gameplay for the effects of a much smaller ship ramming a larger one doing little damage to the larger, or you'de open up pilots in free sidewinders consiously ramming type 9's just to incur costs on other pilots.

No, he changed direction by 90 degrees 2.5 seconds prior to crossing the line of fire, 3 at absolute max. Prior to that he was no threat. It goes without saying that there are moments in combat when you are doing your best to keep your sights on target, [non gimballed] that you can't divert your gaze or you will be off target. And I should add... the incident I had the other day like this involved the AI changing direction, and suddenly crossing my line of fire with pretty much no warming. I certainly didn't have three seconds, or two seconds.
It should also be remembered, that we are all human beings, we are all fallible, we all make mistakes... but a mistake that briefly tickles another ships shields and causes no damage shouldn't be punished in such a disproportionate way. An sustained blast, that is obviously an aggressive act, yes. One gnat bite no. Just common sense really. This zero tolerance policy is dumb.

 

[Derath]

My only positive contribution to I can think of is the current wanted system greatly reduces the desire for turrets, I'm the sort of lazy bosmer who loves turrets or fixed, not the in between variety and turrets currently just blast away almost always ensuring you get a bounty... Then they go to town on the cops too! Too much management imo

 

[MartinW]

I don't really know why these threads deteriorate into arguments about how someone should fly better and shoot less. That simply does not matter, the question is not at all about who is guilty (there are one or two parties in friendly fire accidents, one of which is almost always the shooter) but entirely about what the consequences are. Please note that the AI are doing it as well all the time, not just the cops but law abiding citizens as well who were often just defending themselves against aggressors.

And then they get murdered by everyone in front of your eyes for doing no harm to anyone (except perhaps some wanted person they were focusing on). The reason games are so immersive is because you have to interpret the explicit and implicit rules and focus on the gameplay, you can't just close your eyes and sleep until the movie ends. That's why this kind of silly mechanisms are so counterproductive, people just realize that this kind of weirdness would lead to a pretty disfunctional universe where people get killed and even valuable ships shot to pieces for nothing.

Even if for some reason the Elite universe needs to be a total dystopia where everyone is a sociopath just itching to murder someone else wouldn't the station authorities rather ask for a smuggler or parking offender to stand down or ambush him after landing, taking away his ship and all possessions before shooting him on sight (or perhaps selling to slavery or labor camps or something like that)? Right now I'm checking all the bounties beforehand just so that I know it's not just a few hundred C from an accidental bump - and far too often it is.

The solution is quite simple: make the AI care less about inconsequentially small damage and only reacting to something significant while the human players get an option to forgive team damage before it turns into bounty (unless it's significant). Simple and somewhat hard to exploit.

Yes good post. In fact I would imagine, given the value of the ships in question, the priority would be to seize the ship in the name of profit. What authority do you know that doesn't take every opportunity to take your money? None!

 

[aspiring_captain]

I feel the need to contribute here also because since I've started bounty hunting this has happened to me so often. And yes I use gimballed weapons using an xbox 360 pad.
In other space games if you hit a friendly you get a "watch your fire!" warning and if you do it again they turn on you.
Could we not have a warning in ED??

Seems to me, the sensible thing to do is issue a warning and a fine.
If you happen to have a rack of railguns and instakill a sidewinder then you'll get a bounty on your head and wanted status (and a hefty fine).
What's the problem with that?

 

[Bigcheese]

The solution is quite simple: make the AI care less about inconsequentially small damage and only reacting to something significant while the human players get an option to forgive team damage before it turns into bounty (unless it's significant). Simple and somewhat hard to exploit.

Exactly this. It really is simple, I can't believe people are arguing about it.

 

[Yaffle]

Sorry to be a spoilsport, but in an attempt to keep all the friendly fire posts in one place I've set up a dedicated thread for these.

Feel free to copy-paste your posts from here provided they don't discuss other users, just the topic.

Here's the place to be - https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php?t=91397