Goblin Squad Member
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Just wanted to put up a list of some game play methods the devs have discussed to prevent griefing and ganking.
1. Reputation.
Said to be like the e-bay buyer and seller ratings. As your character undertakes various actions for others, those others will have the opportunity to provide feedback on the results, and you will have the opportunity to do the same in reverse.
This obviously is important whether to associate with people that have poor reputation.
2. Total safe zone
In the hexes containing and immediately adjacent to the NPC settlement, magical effects make it impossible for one character to attack another unless the characters are in war.
3. Marshals
NPC marshals will respond to acts of aggression near their settlement by traveling to the location of the infraction and killing the aggressor. If the attackers get beyond marshals jurisdiction, there will be a cooldown timer imposed, and if the targets reenter the secured area during this time, the marshals will respond again. After the timer expires, the marshals will not respond to the reappearance of the target in their patrolled lands
4. Criminal Flag
Killing someone in areas where there is law against it and breaking and completing certain kinds of contracts can flag a character as a criminal. You can't use fast travel if you've been flagged as a criminal.
When someone has the criminal flag, is he fair game for anyone to kill without consequences? Or with what consequences?
5. Bounty contract
Bounties can only be issued when a character unlawfully kills another. Killing an opponent as a part of a declared war, or in an area that does not have laws against murder, will not trigger the bounty system.
When you are murdered—that is, killed unlawfully—you will have the option to place a bounty on your killer's head. You can specify who can redeem the bounty: a specific character, a chartered adventuring group, or members of a specific player organization. Everyone who is eligible to earn the bounty receives a notification, and if they encounter a character with a price on his head, they'll be reminded of the bounty outstanding on that character. You'll be able to put a bounty on any character who inflicted damage on you within a limited time preceding your character's death, and on their companions and those who rendered them assistance.
Each time the bounty is paid, the victim has the option to issue it again.
6. Death Curse
If you are killed in a non-consensual way, such as being ambushed while minding your own business, you may level a death curse on the killer by praying to Calistria. Doing so costs you reputation, but the cost is reduced if your killer has a low reputation (and if he is a gank-happy killer, he probably will have a very low reputation). Once invoked, the death curse causes your killer's threads to become weakened for a time. If your killer is in turn slain by you or one of your specified agents before the death curse ends, more of his gear may be looted. Your killer cannot have the curse removed by having an ally kill him and refuse to loot him; it only goes away if he is slain by you or someone you specify, such as a member of your group or settlement.
7. Thief tag
When a player is killed by another player, the killer (and his group if he is in one) has looting rights to that player's husk; if anyone else loots it, they get the Thief tag and become a more desirable PvP target.
Mostly taken from the dev blogs. Obviously these leave question. Discuss and add. :)
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Goblin Squad Member
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#1 Players with lower rep will not be able to strongly effect others
#3. The time for response gets longer the further away from the NPC settlement you are.
#8 Kill Penalty:
Whenever a player is killed, the killer suffers a possible chaotic, evil, and reputation shift depending on the conditions of the kill. The more chaotic, evil, or low reputation the target, the less the shift.
I'd add a:
*all of this is speculation, and is subject to change in the future.
to the top.
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Goblin Squad Member
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The first thing that needs to be done is for GW to clearly define what acts are considered griefing. At the moment they have refused to do so, perhaps with good reason.
Second, the same needs to be done for the term ganking. My definition of ganking is to use greater force or numbers to change the risk vs reward ratio to a more favorable chance of success. Using my definition, there should be nothing wrong with ganking at all. No one plans for war and tries to have fair and even fights.
First in- game mechanic for anti griefing is the report function. Describe to the GM what the player is doing. The GM will contact the player and get that person' s view.
Second, the bounty system. The issues I have with the bounty system are two. First, there should not be an infinite bounty . This is as excessive as the griefing that it is meant to stop. One offense, one bounty.
Second, bounties should not be paid out with currency. Rather, they should grant a reputation score specific for collecting bounties. These scores can then unlock gear specifically used for bounty hunting. Scores could also be tied to various titles and accolades.
The problem with bounties being paid with gold is that they can be farmed by the alts or friends of the person you placed the bounty on. No way to prevent this, which is why most will not place bounties.
Another mechanic that might be interesting is if there is a specific skill for Bounty Hunting, where it is required to even take a bounty contract.
Any system for controlling player actions should not overly penalize a player for following his or her profession. Bandits have to be sullied to rob, thieves steal, assassins murder. Sure they can have slignment adjustments, but they should not be penalized beyond the victim having kill rights or being allowed to place one bounty on him.
Just a few thoughts, but typing on this IPhone is a pain.
Goblinworks Executive Founder
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The worst thing GW could do is provide a list and say "items not on the list aren't griefing". The list should be "including but not limited to..." in scope.
Review the blog which describes the bounty system. Some of your specific objections have been accounted for from the first mention of bounties.
I'm not sure what you want for bounty hunters; a faction? There aren't going to be tokens to grind and turn into a vendor for new armor, like in raiding theme parks.
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Goblin Squad Member
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The worst thing GW could do is provide a list and say "items not on the list aren't griefing". The list should be "including but not limited to..." in scope.
Review the blog which describes the bounty system. Some of your specific objections have been accounted for from the first mention of bounties.
What he said.
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Goblin Squad Member
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If the definition of griefing is "we'll know it when we see it." Then PFO should not be open world PVP. The problem is and always will be, one perspn's griefing is another perspn's role playing.
Here is a scenario:
I am a bandit, with 10 members in my band. We spot a caravan traveling to settlement 1. We attack it and kill its two guards. We loot it and let the rest live to go to settlement 1.
20 minutes later, the caravan owned by the same merchant leaves S1 and heads towards S2. We assume he has more cargo going to new location. We attack, kill two guards and loot caravan again.
We have now repeated an attack and used greater force. Is that griefing and ganking? Or is that role playing what bandits do?
Now merchant is really ticked off, so being a millionaire he decides to place an infinite bounty on our heads, far exceeding what we stole from him. We are now hunted down for the next six months and it shifts our risk vs reward to unacceptable levels,
We either stop being bandits, ending our game play, Or we make sure we only attack poor merchants who can't afford infinite bounties, leaving the fat merchants to ply their trade without risk.
The infinite bounty will encourage griefing because if that merchant maintains an infinite bounty, he will be our target of choice at all times. We could not afford to risk having multiple infinite bounties.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I do think infinite bounty renewal is exploitable for griefing. Each infraction should carry one bounty per person per infraction.
Agreed. However, the merchant is fullly capable of declairing war against the bandit group, and encouraging any allies to do so as well. Once war has been declared, pretty much any member of the organization can kill them on sight and not have to worry about alingment or criminal flags.
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Goblin Squad Member
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If the definition of griefing is "we'll know it when we see it." Then PFO should not be open world PVP. The problem is and always will be, one perspn's griefing is another perspn's role playing.
You seem like you are starting from zero with this discussion, but we aren't. We/GW have about two decades of experience with MMO's to work with when we see the phrase "we'll know it when we see it."
In five-star ranking systems I've seen, even the best-behaved people end up at four stars, the worst at two, and most people around three. I've no idea how sensitive PFO's system will be, but I suspect it will ultimately wind up the same way.
Malicious (and sycophantic) votes could be minimized by:
(1) Incremental shifts in reputation per vote, so that it takes multiple votes to change a ranking.
(2) Disallowing votes by your guildmates. These people, after all, can be counted on to view you favorably regardless of circumstance.
(3) Allowing other people to see the number of votes cast for/against you.
(4) Allowing you to see the ranking given you by others. If Being, for example, downranks me and I feel I did a great job for him, I'll know not to accept work from him in future.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Ryan has been purposefully somewhat vague in what he considers to be griefing, with notable exceptions as shown in this quote from the GW Blog:
Many Shades of GriefOne thing that we're deeply committed to at Goblinworks is building a game that has a low tolerance for "griefing." Loosely defined, griefing means taking actions within the game that are designed to harass another player to elicit bad feelings without any other reasonable purpose. Griefing encompasses a wide spectrum of behavior, and there will be players who feel that they have been subjected to griefing while their opponents feel they're engaged in legitimate gameplay. An example is a group who attacks and kills trespassers in a certain area to deny access to that territory to other players. The people trying to get in might feel it's unfair that they keep getting attacked and killed, whereas the attackers feel completely justified in defending their territory. Goblinworks will be creating an organic, evolving policy on griefing to identify practices that we consider abusive. We will take severe action out-of-game against regularly abusive players, while less flagrant issues will be dealt with in-game by way of an innovative bounty system designed to deter unwanted aggression.
There have been attempts at bounty systems in many MMOs in the past, and they tend to have the same problem: If I put a reward on your character's head, you can arrange for one of your friends to kill your character, and you then split the reward with your friend. You're not deterred from doing whatever it was that caused me to place the bounty, and I've ended up giving you and your friend even more of my scarce resources.
Pathfinder Online's bounty system is a lot more selective. When you are murdered—that is, killed unlawfully—you will have the option to place a bounty on your killer's head. The twist is that you can specify who can redeem the bounty: a specific character, a chartered adventuring group, or members of a specific player organization. Everyone who is eligible to earn the bounty receives a notification, and if they encounter a character with a price on his head, they'll be reminded of the bounty outstanding on that character. You'll be able to put a bounty on any character who inflicted damage on you within a limited time preceding your character's death, and on their companions and those who rendered them assistance, so you can ensure that a gang of criminals suffers as much as a lone assassin.
We fully expect that there will be characters who become specialized bounty hunters, tracking down and redeeming bounties and earning acclaim (which will translate into more commissioned bounties). These characters would never want their reputations besmirched by the idea that they'd be splitting the bounties with the targets, so the social reputation of these characters will dictate how successful they are at this role. Furthermore, we expect that some players will form bounty-hunting organizations, and those organizations will also need to maintain scrupulous reputations as agents of vengeance rather than agents of collaboration. Knowing that these experienced and deadly foes may be lawfully unleashed to hunt down and kill murderers will be a powerful deterrent to griefing.
Oh, and one more twist: Each time the bounty is paid, the victim has the option to issue it again. And again. A wealthy victim could maintain the price on the head of a murderer for a very long time—forever, if they like. Murder the wrong person, and you might find your character reduced to a life constantly on the run, or you may need to try to heal the breach via penance and apology (and likely restitution).
Bounties can only be issued when a character unlawfully kills another. Killing an opponent as a part of a declared war, or in an area that does not have laws against murder, will not trigger the bounty system. The intent is to deter characters from arbitrarily attacking and killing others simply for fun. Of course, those who simply wish to avoid any PvP at all will choose to remain within the very high security zones close to NPC settlements where PvP is effectively impossible. Such players will have fewer opportunities to find adventure or to earn treasure than their braver and less risk-averse peers, but they'll be safe from griefers.
Emphasis mine to high-lite the relevant passages. Ryan notes that while some players may think something is griefing, it is very possible GW will not, such as his example of PC's protecting an area that they intend to use for resource gathering or building a settlement by preventing others from entering it.
Bluddwulf, as I see it, and noted it in another thread, I doubt your group will be called griefers by being bandits. It is an important part of the game, since risk is inherent, and with greater risk their is a greater chance for reward. Since bandits, rogues, and the like will operate outside most settlements' spheres of influence, player should be away that if they head past that zone, they might run into bandits and the like. In fact, it is pretty much in the lore of the River Kingdoms, so groups such as yours should exist. In your OOC posts you seem very reasonable, and I trust you would likely "police" your own if someone starts to fit the definition Ryan has set out - they aren't playing bandits to bring some flavor to PFO, but they are doing it just to ruin players' experiences.
I also trust that the bounty system will be part of the "organic" policy, so if GW notices that it is being used to ruin players' fun, it will be adjusted. I agree that there are chances for it to be abused, but that also presumes the economy will grow more like non-sandbox MMO's, with a lot of coins available to be used to do this form of griefing. However, in one of your posts you do bring up how it can be abused by placing a bounty on someone's head for killing someone and repeatedly doing this and allowing only one group, likely working with the bounty placer, to keep killing a PC. I again reiterate that I think this will be something GW will catch and stop. Granted it may take a short while between the events happening and GW taking out of game measures, but I do think Ryan and Lisa want to give us all as much fun as possible with as little griefing as is possible to boot.
Additionally, I do want to add that I enjoy your IC posts a lot. I often find most MMO players don't respect the RP aspects of an MMORPG, focusing solely on the MMO part. You have done a great job of representing your views both IC and OOC.
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Goblinworks Executive Founder
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In five-star ranking systems I've seen, even the best-behaved people end up at four stars, the worst at two, and most people around three. I've no idea how sensitive PFO's system will be, but I suspect it will ultimately wind up the same way.
Malicious (and sycophantic) votes could be minimized by:
(1) Incremental shifts in reputation per vote, so that it takes multiple votes to change a ranking.
(2) Disallowing votes by your guildmates. These people, after all, can be counted on to view you favorably regardless of circumstance.
(3) Allowing other people to see the number of votes cast for/against you.
(4) Allowing you to see the ranking given you by others. If Being, for example, downranks me and I feel I did a great job for him, I'll know not to accept work from him in future.
Good points, here are some quotes for reference/discussion
... When you do something people don't like, they can degrade your reputation, and vice versa. Depending on what triggers your opportunity to affect their reputation, reducing someone else's might also reduce yours too. We want to avoid the obvious problems of "reputation ganking" and alt-grinding your reputation. ...
Regaining reputation is clearly something that the designers are going to have to spend a lot of time thinking about to avoid people abusing whatever system is built. And we don't want the Reputation system to be built so that you slide down a path you don't want and don't really understand - the idea that you'd take a lot of negative Reputation due to someone cleverly exploiting your ignorance of the game mechanic is exactly the kind of thing we're committed to avoiding.
There are other mechanics in Pathfinder Online that describe the relationship between characters. One of those is the reputation system. A "reputation economy" is a method of giving weight to people's actions. Earning a good reputation is valuable, and having a bad reputation can close a lot of doors. eBay's buyer and seller ratings are an example of a reputation economy.
Your character will have a reputation as well. As your character undertakes various actions for others, those others will have the opportunity to provide feedback on the results, and you will have the opportunity to do the same in reverse.
Reputation is a social construct, and your reputation will flow through your social contacts. If nobody I know knows you, I will not have access to any of your reputation information. If some of my social connections know you, I will know what they know about your reputation. Treat my friends well or you may find it hard to do business with me.
We've also considered the idea that one could buy and sell reputation information about other characters. This would allow a character's reputation to cross from one social sphere to another. Your reputation may, in fact, precede you.
Reputation extends to social organizations as well. Chartered companies, settlements and player nations also have reputations, and those reputations are affected by the actions of their components, be they social organizations or individual characters. So what you do reflects not only on yourself, but on your associates.
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Goblin Squad Member
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We have now repeated an attack and used greater force. Is that griefing and ganking? Or is that role playing what bandits do?
Now merchant is really ticked off, so being a millionaire he decides to place an infinite bounty on our heads, far exceeding what we stole from him. We are now hunted down for the next six months and it shifts our risk vs reward to unacceptable levels
Two attacks, especially in the same place (you'd figure the merchant learned the area was dangerous after the first time) is not griefing.
As for infinite bounties, if you're well-known bandits you'll already be hunted down indefinitely, bounty or no bounty. Do you really think the amount of the bounties will be enough to encourage someone to devote enough EXTRA time (that they weren't already spending patrolling/hunting for bandits free of charge) to make you change your mind about your career choice?
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Goblin Squad Member
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Perhaps the option to have a player accept/collect bounties on other players should be left out.
Instead make it where if a bounty is sought against another player, then that player would be hunted by a re-occurring "enemy" who becomes increasingly harder to survive against, until restitution/retribution has been made at 7x an amount deemed the value of whatever they were "wanted" for in the first place.
As for players who wish to play the role of an assassin (or other bounty seeker), their jobs would be to go after NPCs who were comparable in skills/abilities based on the level, class, feats, etc of the person any given bounty was being placed on. The reward received would be the same as if they had gotten the actual player, yet they wouldn't know who the player actually was to "grief" them if they just happened to pass them on the road.
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Goblinworks Executive Founder
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Perhaps the option to have a player accept/collect bounties on other players should be left out.
Instead make it where if a bounty is sought against another player, then that player would be hunted by a re-occurring "enemy" who becomes increasingly harder to survive against, until restitution/retribution has been made at 7x an amount deemed the value of whatever they were "wanted" for in the first place.As for players who wish to play the role of an assassin (or other bounty seeker), their jobs would be to go after NPCs who were comparable in skills/abilities based on the level, class, feats, etc of the person any given bounty was being placed on. The reward received would be the same as if they had gotten the actual player, yet they wouldn't know who the player actually was to "grief" them if they just happened to pass them on the road.
They've already been pretty specific about player being able to see bounties.
Everyone who is eligible to earn the bounty receives a notification, and if they encounter a character with a price on his head, they'll be reminded of the bounty outstanding on that character.
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Goblin Squad Member
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They've already been pretty specific about player being able to see bounties.Everyone who is eligible to earn the bounty receives a notification, and if they encounter a character with a price on his head, they'll be reminded of the bounty outstanding on that character.
This system would still work except that the person who accepts the bounty would be notified when they encountered said "NPC of comparable skill" in my suggestion, rather than "Player named XYZ" (whom they could remember the name of and grief just for laughs), or some other identifying means like guild name etc.
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Goblinworks Executive Founder
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This system would still work except that the person who accepts the bounty would be notified when they encountered said "NPC of comparable skill" in my suggestion, rather than "Player named XYZ" (whom they could remember the name of and grief just for laughs), or some other identifying means like guild name etc.
They've already been pretty specific about player being able to see bounties.Everyone who is eligible to earn the bounty receives a notification, and if they encounter a character with a price on his head, they'll be reminded of the bounty outstanding on that character.
If they are griefing people they are going to end up on the same end of the spectrum of getting bounties placed on them and loosing reputation. The infinite bounties is somewhat of a problem if their aren't incremental costs or time-delays or something but that has all been discussed in depth before.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Bluddwulf, as I see it, and noted it in another thread, I doubt your group will be called griefers by being bandits. It is an important part of the game, since risk is inherent, and with greater risk their is a greater chance for reward. Since bandits, rogues, and the like will operate outside most settlements' spheres of influence, player should be away that if they head past that zone, they might run into bandits and the like. In fact, it is pretty much in the lore of the River Kingdoms, so groups such as yours should exist. In your OOC posts you seem very reasonable, and I trust you would likely "police" your own if someone starts to fit the definition Ryan has set out - they aren't playing bandits to bring some flavor to PFO, but they are doing it just to ruin players' experiences.
I also trust that the bounty system will be part of the "organic" policy, so if GW notices that it is being used to ruin players' fun, it will be adjusted. I agree that there are chances for it to be abused, but that also presumes the economy will grow more like non-sandbox MMO's, with a lot of coins available to be used to do this form of griefing. However, in one of your posts you do bring up how it can be abused by placing a bounty on someone's head for killing someone and repeatedly doing this and allowing only one group, likely working with the bounty placer, to keep killing a PC. I again reiterate that I think this will be something GW will catch and stop. Granted it may take a short while between the events happening and GW taking out of game measures, but I do think Ryan and Lisa want to give us all as much fun as possible with as little griefing as is possible to boot.
Additionally, I do want to add that I enjoy your IC posts a lot. I often find most MMO players don't respect the RP aspects of an MMORPG, focusing solely on the MMO part. You have done a great job of representing your views both IC and OOC.
I missed some of this while reading on my Iphone, but it does clarify a some of the issues.
If they hold to allowing wilderness areas and roads or rivers between settlements being somewhat free for action zones, I will have no issue with it.
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Goblin Squad Member
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When considering reputation, will there be any instance when a negative reputation is a benefit for evil aligned characters?
If not, wont this reputation system inhibit role playing?
we havent heard much about this. I'd imagine evil people can set bounties ob good characters as well
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Goblin Squad Member
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Perhaps the option to have a player accept/collect bounties on other players should be left out.
Instead make it where if a bounty is sought against another player, then that player would be hunted by a re-occurring "enemy" who becomes increasingly harder to survive against, until restitution/retribution has been made at 7x an amount deemed the value of whatever they were "wanted" for in the first place.As for players who wish to play the role of an assassin (or other bounty seeker), their jobs would be to go after NPCs who were comparable in skills/abilities based on the level, class, feats, etc of the person any given bounty was being placed on. The reward received would be the same as if they had gotten the actual player, yet they wouldn't know who the player actually was to "grief" them if they just happened to pass them on the road.
Someone who "just happened to pass on the road" (by sheer coincidence I'm sure) attacking you to collect a bounty on your head, or has an assassination contract (a separate system entirely, about which we have no details yet), is NOT griefing: It's using the game mechanic as it's intended. That's like saying someone shooting you in Call of Duty is griefing - no, they're actually supposed to be doing exactly that.
The game is about player conflict, player cooperation, and all other manner of player interactions. Some players will prefer to use only the simplest interactions (i.e. attacking them) on whoever makes themselves available, they'll find their alignments changing accordingly, others will find more balance.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Ganking isn't really something that can be avoided. Just don't run around in what you cant afford to replace. Then again I guess that is the pod pilot in me speaking. As for griefing it seems that many of their ideas will just encourage more sanctioned griefing e.g. the bounty system.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I'm pretty sure that they are not going to be defining what constitutes griefing as illustrated by Ryan's post
As I've said before, grief is in the eye of the beholder - it cannot be absolutely defined.
I think they also don't want to put a specific definition on it (like with the rules on general chat) because if they draw a hard line of "this is griefing", and "this is not griefing" then they'll have people who are constantly toeing the line and going right up to it and using their own rules to make peoples' experiences miserable but because they haven't crossed that line, they'll not be easily subject to penalties.
Given the fact that they're not trying to draw in millions of people upon launch, I think it's best that they look at things on a case by case basis. I've stated before that I'm not personally a big pvp fan, but I have full confidence that I'll enjoy this game (pvp and all) and that it will be this community (not just the company devs) that will help keep it a great place to play.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Given the fact that they're not trying to draw in millions of people upon launch, I think it's best that they look at things on a case by case basis. I've stated before that I'm not personally a big pvp fan, but I have full confidence that I'll enjoy this game (pvp and all) and that it will be this community (not just the company devs) that will help keep it a great place to play.
I certainly hope so MidnightDiamond, and thank you for the optimism. My great fear is that the Devs or the player community make it so difficult (and I don't mean dangerous) to be a criminal that it will take away the "living breathing world" aspect I'm looking for.
EVE Online made it virtually impossible to be a criminal in high sec space. It is not that I can't steal stuff there, I can. It is that the people I steal from are so afraid to retaliate, they don't. The thrill of the potential for PVP is gone, because no one ever defends their property anymore.
At least if I were stealing candy from a baby, its parents would get upset..... Not in EVE. Its parents say, "Meh welcome to EVE baby, they won't take much.... just keep mining!".
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Goblin Squad Member
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Now merchant is really ticked off, so being a millionaire he decides to place an infinite bounty on our heads, far exceeding what we stole from him. We are now hunted down for the next six months and it shifts our risk vs reward to unacceptable levels,We either stop being bandits, ending our game play, Or we make sure we only attack poor merchants who can't afford infinite bounties, leaving the fat merchants to ply their trade without risk.
The infinite bounty will encourage griefing because if that merchant maintains an infinite bounty, he will be our target of choice at all times. We could not afford to risk having multiple infinite bounties.
I wanted to point out something I thought about after my earlier post.
The travelling merchant is essentially placing a bounty on his own head, out of his own pocket, every time he steps out on the road with a pack or wagon full of goods - for anyone with the strength to claim it, until such a point as bandit attacks shift his risk vs reward to unacceptable levels. Infinite bounties to me just seem like a way for the merchant to even the score, for them to say "hey that guy over there is also valuable to kill", and put the merchant and the bandit on even footing.
Being a merchant subject to bandit attacks already has all the same repercussions you've outlined for bandits suffering from infinite bounties, including being harassed to the point of his risk vs reward being unacceptable and having to stop his preferred gameplay, except to add insult to injury he's paying for the bounty on his own head.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I certainly hope so MidnightDiamond, and thank you for the optimism. My great fear is that the Devs or the player community make it so difficult (and I don't mean dangerous) to be a criminal that it will take away the "living breathing world" aspect I'm looking for.
EVE Online made it virtually impossible to be a criminal in high sec space. It is not that I can't steal stuff there, I can. It is that the people I steal from are so afraid to retaliate, they don't. The thrill of the potential for PVP is gone, because no one ever defends their property anymore.
At least if I were stealing candy from a baby, its parents would get upset..... Not in EVE. Its parents say, "Meh welcome to EVE baby, they won't take much.... just keep mining!".
I think it's going to be very challenging to play a bandit/criminal/evil character--but certainly not impossible. I think those that enjoy rising to meet and exceed such challenges will have a lot of fun with it because there will always be new puzzles to solve (where's my next mark, how do I avoid the patrols--pc or npc--how do I get that new training/equipment I've been needed... and so on). Part of the challenge is going to be in figuring out how to outsmart everyone else.
When it comes down to it, yeah... someone could theoretically keep bounties on someone forever, but realistically there will likely come a point where it becomes more trouble than its worth. As it's been pointed out, those infinite bounties mean that person is pretty rich and thus makes them a greater target for more bandits and then they have to shell out more money for those bandits' bounties and so on... eventually they'll either run out of money or find better means of retribution.
As for the player community--there's such a big chunk of people on here that have expressed so very passionately that they want to play those types of characters that I think it will be embraced by the majority of the community for the sake of content/interaction/necessity in this type of game.
And again, we're not dealing with a company that doesn't listen to their customers. We've got the people actually making the game reading and responding to these forums so that when Early Enrollment comes out (or perhaps even in Alpha) problems arise about how systems can be abused--they're going to hear about it, they're going to care because they want this to be a success. It won't be a standardized "Thank you for your ticket, someone will review it and get back to you in x days."
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Goblin Squad Member
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Maybe you could claim territory of your own (various important trade roads) and/or declare ware on pretty much everyone. That way you could kill and rob them, and they could hunt and kill you without bounties becoming a factor.
One thing that has bothered me about the bounty system are alts, or simply other characters willing to strike a dirty deal with the criminals. All you need is to sneak a character in one of the organizations usually allowed to collect bounties and you could cheat the system. Just let such a character kill your bandits several times, to collect the bounties. And the best thing is, that if you are read, you won't even lose your gear.
Or without the option above, just get “naked” wield a rusty dagger and run towards the nearest host of bounty hunters, and let them kill you. Repeat as often as needed to clear your bounty or make the merchant spend quite a lot of cash.
That could be one of the disadvantages of the system, after all the merchant has little choice, when the bandits are attacking him, but once there is a bounty on their head, the bandit can just decide to get himself killed.
Of course, I hope that Goblinworks has plans to solve this, but it could be a problem with the proposed system (as far as we know it).
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Goblin Squad Member
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Maybe you could claim territory of your own (various important trade roads) and/or declare ware on pretty much everyone. That way you could kill and rob them, and they could hunt and kill you without bounties becoming a factor.
One thing that has bothered me about the bounty system are alts, or simply other characters willing to strike a dirty deal with the criminals. All you need is to sneak a character in one of the organizations usually allowed to collect bounties and you could cheat the system. Just let such a character kill your bandits several times, to collect the bounties. And the best thing is, that if you are read, you won't even lose your gear.
Or without the option above, just get “naked” wield a rusty dagger and run towards the nearest host of bounty hunters, and let them kill you. Repeat as often as needed to clear your bounty or make the merchant spend quite a lot of cash.
That could be one of the disadvantages of the system, after all the merchant has little choice, when the bandits are attacking him, but once there is a bounty on their head, the bandit can just decide to get himself killed.Of course, I hope that Goblinworks has plans to solve this, but it could be a problem with the proposed system (as far as we know it).
I'd think after the first couple of times the people running the organization would become wise to something being up--and even the "goodly" alt doing business with the "evil alt" (sending loot to them) would lose reputation or alignment simply for interacting. And even more so, that's why it's important that the person who places the bounty gets to decide who collects it so that they can minimize this. I can't see an organization wanting to risk a hard won reputation because then no one would allow them to collect bounties anymore if it got around that there was fishy activity. And given the small population of this game compared to something like WoW... word will get around pretty quickly.
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Goblin Squad Member
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You know, as I intend to be a True Neutral Druid whose mission is to promote the interests of Nature and seek balance in the alignments I have been considering fair game any untended resource harvesting sites.
I wonder whether property, even if untended, will be considered an extension of the player.
If Joe Player finds a resource in a hex I frequent, and habitually runs off to do other things leaving his harveting installation untended, I might end up repeatedly destroying his operation.
Could my activity then be construed as griefing? I mean, I am sure it would inconvenience him and he might report me (if I get clumsy and he catches sight of who is doing it).
It seems to me I would not rightly be griefing because I have an alignment-oriented reason for destroying untended resource collectors: he just happens to keep leaving his property where I'm tripping over them. Yet he can claim harrassment because I continuously destroy his property.
Thoughts?
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Goblin Squad Member
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You know, as I intend to be a True Neutral Druid whose mission is to promote the interests of Nature and seek balance in the alignments I have been considering fair game any untended resource harvesting sites.
I wonder whether property, even if untended, will be considered anextension of the player.
If Joe Player finds a resource in a hex I frequent, and habitually runs off to do other things leaving his harveting installation untended I might end up repeatedly destroying his operation.
Could my activity then be construed as griefing? I mean, I am sure it would inconvenience him and he might report me (if I get clumsy and he catches sight of who is doing it).
It seems to me I would not rightly be griefing because I have an alignment-oriented reason for destroying untended resource collectors: he just happens to keep leaving his property where I'm tripping over them. Yet he can claim harrassment because I continuously destroy his property.
Thoughts?
You wouldn't be griefing because you're not doing it for the sheer glee of ruining his day. You're doing it because it's what your character would do. Just as someone who might steal his stuff instead of destroying it would have the same claim.
Might he report you thinking you're a griefer? Maybe. Would the devs look at the situation and see that you're a druid protecting your wilderness and let it be? I'd say the probability is very high.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I missed some of this while reading on my Iphone, but it does clarify a some of...Bluddwulf, as I see it, and noted it in another thread, I doubt your group will be called griefers by being bandits. It is an important part of the game, since risk is inherent, and with greater risk their is a greater chance for reward. Since bandits, rogues, and the like will operate outside most settlements' spheres of influence, player should be away that if they head past that zone, they might run into bandits and the like. In fact, it is pretty much in the lore of the River Kingdoms, so groups such as yours should exist. In your OOC posts you seem very reasonable, and I trust you would likely "police" your own if someone starts to fit the definition Ryan has set out - they aren't playing bandits to bring some flavor to PFO, but they are doing it just to ruin players' experiences.
I also trust that the bounty system will be part of the "organic" policy, so if GW notices that it is being used to ruin players' fun, it will be adjusted. I agree that there are chances for it to be abused, but that also presumes the economy will grow more like non-sandbox MMO's, with a lot of coins available to be used to do this form of griefing. However, in one of your posts you do bring up how it can be abused by placing a bounty on someone's head for killing someone and repeatedly doing this and allowing only one group, likely working with the bounty placer, to keep killing a PC. I again reiterate that I think this will be something GW will catch and stop. Granted it may take a short while between the events happening and GW taking out of game measures, but I do think Ryan and Lisa want to give us all as much fun as possible with as little griefing as is possible to boot.
Additionally, I do want to add that I enjoy your IC posts a lot. I often find most MMO players don't respect the RP aspects of an MMORPG, focusing solely on the MMO part. You have done a great job of representing your views both IC and OOC.
To help pull infinite bounties out of this and the treaty thread, I have set up a new thread here, where the whole use of the bounty system as a tool of griefing can be discussed, as it is an important issue, and one that needs to be addressed separately from general griefing, IMHO.
The more I read of your posts about your legitimate questions regarding bandits/assassins/thieves and other roguish PC's, the more I think it needs to be clearly stated what IS an abuse of the bounty system and what is legitimate, Bluddwulf. Agree?
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Goblin Squad Member
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First post: So, I decloaked for this.
Lots of sandbox people talk about wanting a real world experience, but guess what? You don't see a lot of murder in the real world. Also, in the real world, if you murder someone even once and are caught, you are branded for life and basically screwed. You might get out of jail eventually, but you aren't going to be getting any good jobs with that blot on your record if anyone goes looking.
So we are basically agreed that no penalty for griefing in a game can actually be as harsh as it is in the real world, yes? Because if it were, you would basically shelve that character and never play him/her again.
Also, we are agreed that people tend to be pricks much more often online than in the real world? Again, this is obvious and well-known. Little Steve who might be nice in his mail-clerk job at work is a real bastard online, and talks lots of tough talk because he feels safe knowing that no one knows who he really is.
Both of these problems add on each other. Penalties for griefing online can't ever be as serious as they are in real life, and people are more often pricks online.
What this basically means is that the Paizo people will never, ever be as strict as they OUGHT to be about griefing. But I still think they should be very, very strict. I know the sociopaths out there don't agree (they are sociopaths, after all!) but they really need to crank down hard on this.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Well first off: Welcome, and thank you for decloaking to share your thoughts.
GW (Goblinworks, the developer) has assured everyone that griefing won't be tolerated. That said, they have their own idea of what is and isn't griefing. Killing another player character is not always griefing, and in fact griefing should be fairly rare.
We both know it will happen anyway, and GW does too. But they are willing to perma-ban for it.
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Goblinworks Executive Founder
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Yeah I think the big difference here is that GW is shooting for a comparable small population to consider the game a success. They aren't trying to get and retain millions of players.
This gives them A LOT more flexibility to hand out heavy punishments since they don't have to retain all the potential riff-raff that might come just to cause issues. Rather their focus is on making a really enjoyable game for a smaller dedicated fanbase that will play for several years.
So while a lot of people doubt the gumption of GW to hold to the hard stance on griefing I think they have a really good platform to stick to their guns.
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Goblin Squad Member
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How about some sort of insurance system (similar to EVE´s) to reduce the losses of caravan owners subject to attacks?
There is an insurance system of a sort. The trader hires player characters to be guards on the journey. This puts more money into circulation, gives the guard characters money to buy thing from the trader's clients when they arrive, and provides good opportunity fo 'meaningful interaction'.
But replacement cost insurance from the game would do none of those and it would be completely exploitable when you are 'robbed' by your teamspeak buddies and recompensed by the game itself.
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Goblin Squad Member
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How about some sort of insurance system (similar to EVE´s) to reduce the losses of caravan owners subject to attacks?There is an insurance system of a sort. The trader hires player characters to be guards on the journey. This puts more money into circulation, gives the guard characters money to buy thing from the trader's clients when they arrive, and provides good opportunity fo 'meaningful interaction'.
But replacement cost insurance from the game would do none of those and it would be completely exploitable when you are 'robbed' by your teamspeak buddies and recompensed by the game itself.
I concur with Being's comments. We don't want to figure out ways to remove potential player interaction.
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Goblinworks Executive Founder
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How about some sort of insurance system (similar to EVE´s) to reduce the losses of caravan owners subject to attacks?There is an insurance system of a sort. The trader hires player characters to be guards on the journey. This puts more money into circulation, gives the guard characters money to buy thing from the trader's clients when they arrive, and provides good opportunity fo 'meaningful interaction'.
But replacement cost insurance from the game would do none of those and it would be completely exploitable when you are 'robbed' by your teamspeak buddies and recompensed by the game itself.
Unless you had to actively pay into insurance for it to be viable and if you have too many *accidents* you get dropped from your insurance. I think this could potentially be a really cool player run system :D
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I Don´t know about you but in my perspective working as a guard in a caravan may be something boring (unless it gets attacked of course) and may not be exactly something attractive for players to engage.
Hired guards will be earning money for their work; the coin may be attractive in itself. The guards may also ask for payment in goods and services, such as a piece of finely crafted armor that they have no other contacts for. The reputation gained for being a well-known, respected hired guard is also a possible benefit.
There's also the RP element. Chiassa would make a terrible guard, but having the chance to RP with different groups while escorting them through dangerous areas is certainly something to consider.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I just remembered this anti griefing mechanic from Fallen Earth. When you respawned at your body, you had a 30 second or 60 second (forget which) timer where you were invulnerable and you could not attack anything. This always gave you enough time to leave the area, or reset and prepare for combat again.
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Goblin Squad Member
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The main issue with trying to stop humans with a system is that the humans you want to stop will be the ones hardest trying to circumvent the system. A player not interested in PKing won't be motivated to study the ins and outs of the system, while someone interested in that activity will have the information advantage.
1) Either through manipulation or just by gathering a large amount of players in a similar situation, they could get their reputation to the positives. Hell, maybe more positive than most average players.
2) Full protection for gankers. Been tried in a ton of different games and that is always the outcome. Also makes it useless to craft or do any non-combat activity outside these places.
3) This works decently in EVE but can still be used to scam newer or just less aware players. Not a deterrent to ganking at all as people just put on their "suicide suits" and kill you or find some way for you to become the aggressor.
4) Gankers have alts that aren't criminals standing next to them so any AoE or unintentional hit will cause you to be flagged. Congratulations now you can be looted by the "innocent" alts.
5) This is a more player-driven system which is why it is one of the better ideas they've come up with. Of course, it doesn't protect anyone either.
6) This is detailed, which makes it more likely to hit the "right" players, but at the same time the details cause it to be less newbie-friendly and usable against players who haven't taken the time to study ganking deterrents.
7) Not really an anti-ganking measure (and I would not call it anti-griefing either since they've stated that actions considered griefing are bannable).
I think the best choice is to leave the "law" up to the players as much as possible. The safest I've ever been in any of these kinds of games has been in the base of my clan or guild. Yes, solo players are more at risk than others. That's simply something you have to consider when you choose to play solo.
1) From my understanding, a reputation + will not be as good coming from a low rep chaotic evil as it would from a high rep lawful good. And even so, I believe if you did see this happening, you will probably want to report some people for "buying" rep... If that is a bannable offense.
2) What Full Protection for gankers? You are going to be at HIGH risk doing a life of crime. A list: Bounty Hunters after you, KoS in nicer settlements, and I'm going to think trice before I do business with a Chaotic Evil person (if I know they are.) Also, GUARDS!3) I think that could be because it wasn't told to them up front. Even having a suicide suit, you will still suffer as mentioned in #2. As for provoking someone, if someone is giving you a hard time, walk away, and probably dock their reputation.
4) It's no different than a fireball in a crowded place to catch a thief. Try and avoid this (And if you KNOW they are doing this, probably a report is in progress.)
5) Protection depends on the area. In some areas it will be suicide to attempt to unlawfully kill someone, where in others, not so much. On the other hand, you as a player should know the risks outside, and should prepare as such (mercenaries is a start.)
6) We still don't know how the tutorial is like, or if we will have people "camping" around the NPC settlements where people start, and then guiding them (I'm looking at you, several nice companies)
7) It's not like they will just release it and say done. I bet they will patch "exploits" as they are found out.
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Goblin Squad Member
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what i think will help.
1) active bounty system
2) encourage players to help each other (people who help take out the greifers and such), create alliances for protection.
3) similar to EVE have high sec, low sec, and no sec areas. Have various level rewards/rares to encourage people to leave high sec (so that ultra rare material for the holy avenger is in no sec). Also set it up so that you can get to places faster if you travel through no sec than stay in high sec (for example high sec would be taking the long way around).
4) Allow player nations/settlements to decide if their hexs are high/low/no sec. A CE nation might go ehhh, its free for all here while a LG nation might decide to be low or high sec.
5) meaningful alignment system (no idea how they would do this but im not the game designer)
6) Inform the player base that griefing will not be tolerated.
7) Inform the player base that no mechanical system to punish greifing and such will work 100%.
8) inform the player base that using any method to get around those systems (blue blocking, trading reputation, trading alignment, making deals with friends to do your bounty, contracting with someone else to do your bounty and split it...etc.) are considered exploits and will not be tolorated.
9) anyone doing #8 the first time gets all training for 6 months removed and all items destroyed, on all characters, on all accounts associated with the people who did it. The second time is banhammer.
At the end of the day clever players will get around pretty much any mechanical system the devs put in place. The key is for the devs to take an active role in the game and tell folks doing that is wrong, and laying down the brimstone when people get caught.
The funny thing is that in a sandbox like this, PvP (such as war between nations/settlements) is important. It gives people goals. In a game like this bandits also add to the game (not as much as some of them think) as they add risk to traveling around, and provide another danger. The problem is balancing the whole bandit/assasination thing so that it does not end up free for all greifing.
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Goblinworks Executive Founder
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Several trivial ways to ensure that bounties last for a finite period of time, without capping them: