Yet another FF/C&P thread, on mitigating insta-bounties with persistence and reputation

[ElectricZ]

So CMDR Goodguy is the type who likes to park in a system, adopt a local faction and rep up by running missions/hauling cargo/bounty hunting in the local area to boost that controlling faction. He might have even been brought to the system by a famine, outbreak or civil unrest and spent a lot of time and effort hauling medicines and food to save orphans and grandparents from horrible deaths, or to clean a system out from miscreants looking to cripple the local economy and upset law and order by killing security forces and traders.

CMDR Goodguy is the type who will spend days, or even weeks in one spot, bringing almost every minor faction within 20 light years to Allied status. He doesn't take illegal missions of any sort, engage in piracy, and scans every target before firing to keep from killing the innocent. Every local ship on the local radar is bright green. Every station greets him with a hearty "An ally like you is always welcome here." He is Captain James T. Kirk, Mahatma K. Ghandi, and Jesus H. Christ all rolled into one.

Yet a single shot made in error, or the result of bad luck, or network synchronization issues can result in a 200 credit bounty, instantly turning CMDR Goodguy into Galactic Enemy #1.

For 200 credits.

"Trigger discipline," "git gud," "if you can't do the time don't do the crime," "you just want an easy button, "this is is Elite DANGEROUS," etc. I get all that. I got no problem with consequences and lethal response. But especially with the new C&P changes the response of law enforcement just frustrating and nonsensical, especially if you are the type of player who enjoys playing the hero, hanging around in a handful of systems righting the wrongs of the galaxy.

Seriously, I've been to your station 20 times in the past two days. I've cured your outbreak. I've ended your famine. I've turned in millions in bounties and countless escape pods. I've spent hours in the presence of your security ships assisting them in upholding the law. By this time, there should be ' statues of me at the front and back of every landing pad on your station so launching or landing everybody can recognize my great, good works. I may be the only reason your backwater system still exists at all.

Whoops, stray shot, you don't know me anymore.

I'm now evil incarnate, worthy of death sentence, with a 200 credit penalty outweighing *everything* else I've done.

They've added notoriety to the game, which is a good concept. How about going in the other direction, some yin to go with the yang, and taking account positive reputation? Make that bright, emerald green ALLIED status mean something, and give just a little leeway in a C&P system that is NOT perfect before issuing a death warrant.

When a "accidental discharge" incident occurs, check against the pilot's reputation. Any notoriety at all? That goes straight into a bounty. Does the CMDR already have unpaid fines? Repeat offender, hit 'em with a bounty. But notoriety 0? An Ally who is Always Welcome? Clean record? Before we put out a galactic death warrant, let's see how we feel about this person..

Hey, CMDR Goodguy is an ally! Which means we've seen him a few times before and like him a lot. It was one stray shot and hit shields only, and he stopped firing. He's got a clean record, no fines on the book. He probably didn't mean to do it. "Check your fire, Commander," and hit him with a fine. If it happens again and that fine is in place, it's time for a bounty. Maybe knock CMDR Goodguy from Allied to Friendly, just to get the point across. A truly good CMDR will work his way back up to allied in no time at all.

If CMDR Goodguy is only friendly, well that still means we think he's all right and gets the benefit of the doubt. "Careful, CMDR," along with another a fine, and his reputation drops to Cordial," etc. At Cordial, same thing, except you drop to Neutral, possibly working your way down to hostile if you keep shooting up friendly/clean targets.

Checking against a pilot's reputation before issuing an instant execution warrant will reduce frustration, give another in-game benefit for working up local reputation, and can even add a little bit of that mythical "immersion" that some people keep going on about, all while preserving a system where bad guys get punished for doing bad things.

 

[Mohrgan]

The game's response to FF has been made easier with 3.0. A new crime, 'Reckless Weapons Discharge', and an increase in the FF threshold have both been included with the release. How you pay for your Fines for FF has also been simplified with IF contacts and the Anonymous protocol. NPC ships already do take reputation into effect. All of that has been built into the system, some of it for a while now.

As to the response of the NPC's when you finally do exceed the FF threshold, it has been the same since release. You get chased out of the instance to pay your dues. Go and read the C&P outline provided by FD, get prepared and play on.

P.S. It's all about the Kirk.

 

[ElectricZ]

The game's response to FF has been made easier with 3.0. A new crime, 'Reckless Weapons Discharge', and an increase in the FF threshold have both been included with the release. How you pay for your Fines for FF has also been simplified with IF contacts and the Anonymous protocol. NPC ships already do take reputation into effect. All of that has been built into the system, some of it for a while now.

Yeah I've read that stuff too, but that's not the game I'm playing now. It's still not working right, and it's not just about friendly fire but flaws in how the game registers crime.

For example, last night, I got interdicted by a type 10, wanted. I engage and begin to fight. My wingman, after several attempts (another issue with the game) finally drops in on my beacon and sees the Type 10 shooting me. Again, wanted, and again, in the act of committing a crime. He shoots the type 10 and is instantly hit with a 100 credit assault bounty. By this time system security has shown up, and they all go red. Because I'm a wing mate, they go hostile to ME (which didn't used to happen, but does now.)

Because crap like this happens enough, we both know to button up immediately bust a move out of there. But now we're both hot, in this case because my wingman shot a legitimate bad guy, but the same thing can happen with a stray shot against a cop or clean NPC. These updated FF threshholds and "reckless weapons discharge" additions would be great, but regardless my wingmate and I, both local heroes in the system where this occurred, had to flee for our lives because of a petty bounty, in this case incurred because of some kind of synchronization error.

I'm not arguing against the mechanism of friendly fire so much as the mechanics of turning an allied CMDR into Public Enemy No. 1 because of a 200 cr bounty.

 

[Mohrgan]

Yeah I've read that stuff too, but that's not the game I'm playing now. It's still not working right, and it's not just about friendly fire but flaws in how the game registers crime.

For example, last night, I got interdicted by a type 10, wanted. I engage and begin to fight. My wingman, after several attempts (another issue with the game) finally drops in on my beacon and sees the Type 10 shooting me. Again, wanted, and again, in the act of committing a crime. He shoots the type 10 and is instantly hit with a 100 credit assault bounty. By this time system security has shown up, and they all go red. Because I'm a wing mate, they go hostile to ME (which didn't used to happen, but does now.)

Because crap like this happens enough, we both know to button up immediately bust a move out of there. But now we're both hot, in this case because my wingman shot a legitimate bad guy, but the same thing can happen with a stray shot against a cop or clean NPC. These updated FF threshholds and "reckless weapons discharge" additions would be great, but regardless my wingmate and I, both local heroes in the system where this occurred, had to flee for our lives because of a petty bounty, in this case incurred because of some kind of synchronization error.

I'm not arguing against the mechanism of friendly fire so much as the mechanics of turning an allied CMDR into Public Enemy No. 1 because of a 200 cr bounty.

That is a reasonable complaint. In my understanding if a crime was committed on you, your Wing Mate should have been ok to fire, but why wouldn't he/she out of habit just wait for the scan to resolve? You should report it to FD as a bug, and see what they can do. Not turn it into a relatively baseless complaint about FF and C&P. This sounds more like a Winging/Connection issue, rather than a problem with C&P.

 

[Deleted member 115407]

Yeah I've read that stuff too, but that's not the game I'm playing now. It's still not working right, and it's not just about friendly fire but flaws in how the game registers crime.

For example, last night, I got interdicted by a type 10, wanted. I engage and begin to fight. My wingman, after several attempts (another issue with the game) finally drops in on my beacon and sees the Type 10 shooting me. Again, wanted, and again, in the act of committing a crime. He shoots the type 10 and is instantly hit with a 100 credit assault bounty. By this time system security has shown up, and they all go red. Because I'm a wing mate, they go hostile to ME (which didn't used to happen, but does now.)

Because crap like this happens enough, we both know to button up immediately bust a move out of there. But now we're both hot, in this case because my wingman shot a legitimate bad guy, but the same thing can happen with a stray shot against a cop or clean NPC. These updated FF threshholds and "reckless weapons discharge" additions would be great, but regardless my wingmate and I, both local heroes in the system where this occurred, had to flee for our lives because of a petty bounty, in this case incurred because of some kind of synchronization error.

I'm not arguing against the mechanism of friendly fire so much as the mechanics of turning an allied CMDR into Public Enemy No. 1 because of a 200 cr bounty.

Your wingman should have waited to complete his scan.

However, I'm a proponent of the idea that if a scan has been completed for one wing member, it has been completed for all. (If that happens now and I just didn't notice, then forgive me. I think it works that way if you're in the same instance, but if he drops in after the fact...?).

I don't see why security should ignore you if your wingmate goes wanted. You guys are partners in crime, after all.

 

[ElectricZ]

but why wouldn't he/she out of habit just wait for the scan to resolve? You should report it to FD as a bug, and see what they can do. Not turn it into a relatively baseless complaint about FF and C&P. This sounds more like a Winging/Connection issue, rather than a problem with C&P.

Your wingman should have waited to complete his scan.

For the sake of the thread, ignore my Type 10 example. Scanning/sync issues are not what I am trying to make a point about. There are plenty of threads (and bug reports) on that.

My point is that for a non-lethal crime with a penalty of 200 credits, a system in which you are allied and spent tremendous effort to help forgets anything you've done for them and marks you for death. If you play ED for any kind of immersion/RP purposes or just appreciate logical game mechanics, this kind of thing will drive you crazy. Not just the fact that a 200 credit assault bounty turns you into Darth Vader, but that after you pay it off the system security forces that were trying to kill you turn back to bright green and welcome you with open arms.

It means you're not playing in a deeply thought out spaceship sim with complicated but logical mechanics, but a really sharp looking arcade game disguised as a sim with lots of pretty looking dials and switches and buttons that are all connected to a score counter.

Just out of curiosity, can you suggest a reason *not* to implement some kind of reputation check? After all, that's what notoriety was introduced for. Why not allow CMDRs who do good deeds to earn some good will for going the other way?

 

[Mohrgan]

For the sake of the thread, ignore my Type 10 example. Scanning/sync issues are not what I am trying to make a point about. There are plenty of threads (and bug reports) on that.

My point is that for a non-lethal crime with a penalty of 200 credits, a system in which you are allied and spent tremendous effort to help forgets anything you've done for them and marks you for death. If you play ED for any kind of immersion/RP purposes or just appreciate logical game mechanics, this kind of thing will drive you crazy. Not just the fact that a 200 credit assault bounty turns you into Darth Vader, but that after you pay it off the system security forces that were trying to kill you turn back to bright green and welcome you with open arms.

It means you're not playing in a deeply thought out spaceship sim with complicated but logical mechanics, but a really sharp looking arcade game disguised as a sim with lots of pretty looking dials and switches and buttons that are all connected to a score counter.

Just out of curiosity, can you suggest a reason *not* to implement some kind of reputation check? After all, that's what notoriety was introduced for. Why not allow CMDRs who do good deeds to earn some good will for going the other way?

The game already does allow for your Rep to influence the FF limit. That kind of leeway was added into the game, in the 1.X releases of the game. I get messages from NPC's, from time to time, to 'Watch it Commander'. Maybe the issue here is the threshold doesn't allow for highly Engineered weapons/PDs to unload on a target and still remain below the FF threshold. That is a debatable topic, but what you are asking for has already been baked in.

 

[Deleted member 115407]

The game already does allow for your Rep to influence the FF limit. That kind of leeway was added into the game, in the 1.X releases of the game. I get messages from NPC's, from time to time, to 'Watch it Commander'. Maybe the issue here is the threshold doesn't allow for highly Engineered weapons/PDs to unload on a target and still remain below the FF threshold. That is a debatable topic, but what you are asking for has already been baked in.

This^

 

[cmdr underhill]

The most significant issue I'm seeing here looks like some things that should be fines are bounties instead. Looks like we'll need a good rebalance and tweak period for C&P. I wonder if "reckless weapon discharge" should always be a fine.

 

[NecasekO]

To me the little sub-1000 Cr bounties never made sense. If you want to claim a 200 Cr bounty by killing a ship, it is very likely it won't even cover fuel and ammo costs. The game uses these bounties as a permission to legally attack - if clean ship A attacks clean ship B, ship A becomes wanted and ship B can shoot back without getting a fine. Similar with trespass bounties where the little bounty allows local security to attack. But tying this to security ships faction wide attacking on sight and blocking station services makes little sense.

Another issue IMO is that security forces often drop whatever they are doing to swarm a ship with 200 Cr bounty instead of other ships in the area with 20000 Cr bounties. I understand that this behavior is supposed to protect ships that get attacked but it just doesn't deal well with accidental shots. And accidents do happen to 99% of players.

I believe it would help to introduce an intermediate state between clean and wanted, which would allow attacking that ship freely (shooting back) but wouldn't block station services and wouldn't trigger security response everywhere you go.

 

[Kaocraft]

@OP: your problems all come from bugs in the game which can and should be fixed. There's no point in making more modifications to the C&P system (i.e. Building more systems) in order to compensate for what are known bugs in the existing systems. We just need to fix the bugs. That's all.

Your main main complaint about a 200cr "stray shot" is already something that's not supposed to happen. It should be *impossible* to gain a bounty for landing a single stray shot on an untargeted ship; only a fine. Now, if you're massaging the facts and trying to equate "stray shot" with directed fire on a targeted ship that is either clean or unscanned; well sorry that's not Captain Kirk behavior and you should definitely get a bounty and be chased out of the instance when you do that.

 

[ElectricZ]

The game already does allow for your Rep to influence the FF limit. That kind of leeway was added into the game, in the 1.X releases of the game. I get messages from NPC's, from time to time, to 'Watch it Commander'. Maybe the issue here is the threshold doesn't allow for highly Engineered weapons/PDs to unload on a target and still remain below the FF threshold. That is a debatable topic, but what you are asking for has already been baked in.

No, It has not. Perhaps I made a mistake in using FF, but it's the best known and easiest way for a lawful commander to end up as a criminal, either through accident or by bug. But it could be any action that results in a small bounty.

There's only one response possible for crimes right now and that's death. It doesn't matter if you're a cop killer or a mass murderer, or if you just had an unlucky shot or the game decided to glitch out on you at that moment. Having systems go hostile to you if you're leaving the dead hulks of destroyed traders behind you is one thing. Having them all turn against you because the scanner didn't register "wamted" even though the screen clearly labels the ship in red as Wanted, or you forgot to pay a loitering fine is what I'm getting at. There is no middle ground.

If you've taken the time and effort to ally yourself with a faction, it would be nice if they treated you as an ally, if they would remember you as a good or bad pilot, an asset or a threat. If the game would allow for a "benefit of the doubt," if an accident didn't result in a death sentence. If, when confronted by a 200 credit bounty, "Allied" status meant that in some imaginary office somewhere, or in some imaginary Crime Watch System, your case was flagged for review because your past behavior proves you're not a psychopath deserving of death.

It bugs me that "An ally like me is always welcome" turns into "we'll shoot you on sight, you monster" until I pay 200 credits, and then come right back to "Welcome back Commander" like nothing happened. Either my crime wasn't actually that serious in which case being on a KOS list is overkill, or if it WAS that serious then I shouldn't be able to wipe the slate clean for 200 credits.

Or, and I think this is the reality, this is a long-standing gap in how crime and punishment is handled and I think the game would be improved in depth and gameplay by addressing it.