I have no problem with this. Griefers don't stop, so why should the people who suffer from them. Only griefers stand to lose the most from this. Most people that are not griefers won't suffer from this abuse, and if griefers wish to abuse this system, they first have to allow themselves to die, something contrary to their mentality I suspect. And then fork over the coin, again, against their mentality. They are about taking from others while losing nothing. I can't digest of them paying for the rights to abuse a system. That would force them to play the game, something that goes against griefing as well. They don't play the game, they abuse it.
This will not be abused much I suspect, as it will be too costly in the long run, as players that manage to level up cost more to bounty out. Built in abuse protection. But to the griefers who don't normally run in packs with deep pockets, watch out. I can see guilds dropping piles of coin on victims just so they can get it back through the system. And strangely, I have no problem with that at all. It's just money after all, not rep or anything of import.
Goblin Squad Member
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From the blog :
"Each time the bounty is paid, the victim has the option to issue it again. And again."That sounds to me like a pro griefing mechanic. I see no good reason why you would encourage players to that kind of behaviour. There HAS to be a limit to the number of times you can issue a bounty (3 maybe ?) or people will just go get themselves killed just so they can grief the killer forever with infinite bounties.
It's the bounty hunters money, if the bounty is cheap then people won't bother with it, if it is expensive then the placer will go bankrupt pretty fast. I believe bounties are also only able to be placed when killed in law enforced territory and not in wilderness anarchy zones, so really it isn't easy to catch normal people with a bounty.
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if griefers wish to abuse this system, they first have to allow themselves to die, something contrary to their mentality I suspect.
Not even a little bit. In EQ, PVPers would regularly down-level themselves by dying over and over so that they could use their more effectively geared toons to kill the heck out of people whose characters were legitimately level X and hadn't yet acquired that sort of gear or various other bonuses that came with having been higher level and done higher level quests and dungeons. As someone who didn't PVP much in EverQuest, it seemed counter-intuitive to me to 'level down,' but it was both effective and popular. If killing your character a time or two allows you to grief someone *forever,* you can be sure that it will be a popular choice. After all, you get XP just by having an account. It's not like you have to go get that XP back by hunting mobs to 'make up the loss,' as in Everquest... Consequence-free griefing.
From the perspective of someone who watched people get killed over and over in Ultima Online at the hands of packs of naked mages who would sit right outside of town, wearing no equipment at all, and carrying only a single use of whatever reagent they needed to cast their deadliest spell, and nuke the hell out of anyone leaving town en masse, looting them, and sending someone who hadn't participated in the PVP into town to store all of the looted gear and bring them back another set of reagents so that they could do it all over again, pretty much every blog that talks about PFOnline's 'anti-griefing measures' makes it sound like a griefer's *paradise,* one that will not only fail to discourage, but actually reward epic douchebaggery.
Now, if only the guards can be tricked into attacking players that you've maneuvered into accidentally including you in an AoE effect, flagging them as 'player-killers' and getting the town guard to mercilessly death-camp them, PFOnline will be a dream come true for the sorts of people who did that in UO and EQ. (Tricking the NPC Kelethin guards into killing the NPC Priest of Discord, a battle that would generally kill every player character in the wood elf starting city, and a few merchants / trainers as well, was always good for an evil chuckle. With practice you could trigger it without getting killed, yourself.)
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Goblin Squad Member
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if griefers wish to abuse this system, they first have to allow themselves to die, something contrary to their mentality I suspect.Not even a little bit. In EQ, PVPers would regularly down-level themselves by dying over and over so that they could use their more effectively geared toons to kill the heck out of people whose characters were legitimately level X and hadn't yet acquired that sort of gear or various other bonuses that came with having been higher level and done higher level quests and dungeons.
But even then there was a profit motive... what is the profit motive in bounty griefing?
Step 1. Trick someone into killing you in lawful territory, since killing is the crime not looting they may as well loot if you are carrying anything. Net loss: Carried items (so assuming carrying nothing, equipment damage may be possible, but assuming not or assuming naked suicider, net gain 0)
Step 2. Place bounty: Net loss X gold for bounty
Step 3. Re place bounty: Net loss X gold for bounty
Goto step 3
I'm sure you can pay someone to be a jerk anyway, odds are also people will figure out your bounty is BS, and even if they don't, you are just pouring money out for 0 gain. Either you are offering your bounty out to other griefers, or legitimate players, if legitimate players learn what you are doing, then your "victim" may just store everything, and let someone kill him ad-infinium to bankrupt you, if you are only issuing the evil bounty to other jerks.. well what has it changed, jerks will be jerks, they don't need the bounty to be jerks.
The mages in ultima scenerio won't likely be a plausible event... if they were to attempt it anywhere near town they'd be ganked by the guards on their first attempt, and never make it anywhere near any NPC to unload their ill-gotten gains short term, long term the NPCs would eventually determine them evil, and they would not be able to return to the town without the guards attacking.
Now if they try it in player towns... well they'd probably just get roasted and launched out of town, you get a bad reputation and become kill on sight far faster in player territory than in NPC lands.
I highly doubt the guards will be easy to trick into attacking players, not saying it is imposible but it is very highly unlikely. If friendly fire is on and it is large enough area to hit innocents, than people won't use aoes in high security areas, out of fear of accidentally hitting guards or other players, it is that simple.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Huh.. I missed that part.
That seems horribly broken then. Too high of a penalty imo and it makes high security areas very safe and easy to bot in.
Seeing as how people running bots will likely have lots of cash...
Not really, high security area will have the fewest and least valuable resources. I'm not sure of the extent but I would imagine a week of 24/7 botting in high sec (even assuming of course they can't detect botting and all of the tasks are easy enough to bot, and the GMs have no concern or drive to prevent botting which is not a given), will still be significantly less reward than an active player can make 3 hours a day in high risk high reward territory.
Goblinworks Executive Founder
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I would love to see someone try 24/7 botting against people willing to get bounties. After a little observation, the bandits will learn roughly when the botter unloads. About an hour before that point, the bandits swoop in, drops the botter in a few seconds, and get killed by the guards. Their accomplice slips in and loots the botter's corpse and gets a percentage of the entire day or week's worth of gathering.
If the botter tries to put a bounty on the bandits for that, the bandits turn themselves in to the authorized agents, repeatedly. Everyone knows, or can see for themselves, that the botter is a botter, so they collect and split the bounty repeatedly, or just refuse to collect the bounty.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Huh.. I missed that part.
That seems horribly broken then. Too high of a penalty imo and it makes high security areas very safe and easy to bot in.
Seeing as how people running bots will likely have lots of cash...
It is impossible for the penalty to be too high. The act of killing a player outside of factional PvP serves no purpose other than causing them grief and/or stealing their stuff. There will be plenty of legitimate PvP.
You would be amazed how easy it is to not be a dick. If being a dick is part of your 'character' then you get to deal with the consequences, possibly perminantly.
The latest blog post hinted at bounties being post-able to your charter, making the system not abuse-able.
For everyone that seems to be missing a key detail:
according to the information given to us, killing a player unlawfully always will result in a bounty. If you are in a "safe zone" NPC's are dispatched to go and 1 shot your attacker. This gives you a chance to get your stuff back.
I would push to further the penalty to not being able to enter lawful settlements with NPC guards. They should kill on contact for free without removing the bounty.
As for botting, have fun, but don't get sad when you are permanently moved to the back of the line, waiting for a general release when the game has and un-capped population. And the core mechanics of the game suggest botting will be in very low demand, any significant gathering needs to be done with a team and you "level" by training skills that take RL time to complete.
Chief Technical Officer
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There HAS to be a limit to the number of times you can issue a bounty (3 maybe ?) or people will just go get themselves killed just so they can grief the killer forever with infinite bounties.
Remember that you can only place a bounty on someone if you were killed *unlawfully* by them. If you persuade somebody to unlawfully murder you, they will know the potential for consequences... so maybe they deserve what they get!
If the system popped a warning up prior to engagement on the first attempt to attack (which happens in EvE), warning about the bounty possibility, that should be sufficient. Also, I think that if you saved your chat log and contacted a GM about the situation, you can make a claim that you were performing a service as requested, and the person who tried to add that bounty will be censured, as they are trying to set up a griefing situation.
It is impossible for the penalty to be too high. The act of killing a player outside of factional PvP serves no purpose other than causing them grief and/or stealing their stuff. There will be plenty of legitimate PvP.
You would be amazed how easy it is to not be a dick. If being a dick is part of your 'character' then you get to deal with the consequences, possibly perminantly.
The latest blog post hinted at bounties being post-able to your charter, making the system not abuse-able.
For everyone that seems to be missing a key detail:
according to the information given to us, killing a player unlawfully always will result in a bounty. If you are in a "safe zone" NPC's are dispatched to go and 1 shot your attacker. This gives you a chance to get your stuff back.
I would push to further the penalty to not being able to enter lawful settlements with NPC guards. They should kill on contact for free without removing the bounty.
As for botting, have fun, but don't get sad when you are permanently moved to the back of the line, waiting for a general release when the game has and un-capped population. And the core mechanics of the game suggest botting will be in very low demand, any significant gathering needs to be done with a team and you "level" by training skills that take RL time to complete.
Also botting for mat collection will ultimately fail, as you try to gather resources but do not adequately code for random attacks based on the level of the area you are in and the size of the resource you are gathering. Random attacks tend to deter bots, and if you add PvP to the situation, you can effectively send most bots into a loop; even doing something as simple as sending a trade request can freeze up a bot and allow an NPC to kill it while engaged.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Personally I love how this bounty system is sounding. I'll probably be playing at least one character as some sort of bandit and the bounty system sounds like it could really make banditry challenging (in a good way) and really exciting. I mean, if I actually manage to get decent at my unsavoury trade (i.e. not get constantly killed by my targets and stuff like that) and earn some fame within the world I'll probably be having a bunch of bounties on me. That would not only make it a lot more fair for my victims it would also add to the feeling of immersion (at least that's what I think).
I mean if I could just kill people and there would be no consequences what so ever it'd just be griefing and that's no fun. This way I can, and fully intend to (to the best of my capabilities), roleplay a (possibly) infamous bandit on the run from the law and that, to me, sounds like it could be really awesome.
I feel like adding that I don't really take pleasure in griefing people in MMOs and that I'd play a bandit to be a bandit, not to be a PKer who kills anyone just for the heck of it.
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Goblin Squad Member
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It is impossible for the penalty to be too high. The act of killing a player outside of factional PvP serves no purpose other than causing them grief and/or stealing their stuff. There will be plenty of legitimate PvP.
Have you ever played a game with Open World PVP? This statement is utterly false.
I have been playing Open World PVP games for over a decade. I have spent 99.99% of my time doing so as an anti-griefer. I have killed TONS of players that were "blue" or whatever the term for a lawful player of a friendly faction is. Theives who steal/destroy things not protected by law. People who use war systems to bully on weak clans who have done nothing to harm them. People who use things like blocking doorways or just talking in chat to troll people. I feel no reason to stay my sword against such players.
People will always find a way to abuse the lawful-unlawful system of a game, or use factional systems to grief players of other factions. I for one, do not stand for griefing no matter who's faction it is on. I have flat out told members of my own clan, that if they grief newbs in enemy factions, I'll put my swords straight through their back before the enemy ever gets to them.
Anti-griefing rules use no discretion in deciding what is lawful or not. Players can. And as long is that is the case, anti-griefers will be killing blues who abuse the system.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I think by "outside of factional PvP", what he meant to say was "unlawful PvP". It would be absurd, based on what goblinworks has described, to think somebody will have to be part of a faction involved in official conflict to be either the subject or the object or a PvP scenario.
Language can be a lot more precise and accurate than people usually make it out to be. Seems to be a common thing on the internet though for people who can't communicate well to blame you for not reading what they meant to write rather than what they actually wrote. Apply the Dunning Kruger effect to communication skills and you can see why so many internet conversations make so little sense.
I'm not accusing Valkenr of any of that, I'm just going off on a scatter-brained tangent. Talking to myself...don't mind me.
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Goblinworks Executive Founder
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On the subject of communication skills: xkcd makes the point "Anyone who says that they're great at communicating but 'people are bad at listening' is confused about how communication works.
Not directed at anyone in particular; I've taken classes in communication from three separate entities, so I recognize every poor communication technique except those that I still use.
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Goblin Squad Member
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It can be frustrating waiting people to see that they are not saying what they mean clearly. Worse yet is when they are saying something clearly, but it is not what they mean.
The Dunning-Kruger effect explains why they often think it is your fault for believing they meant what they actually said.
Never, ever try explaining this to your wife. Women don't need to make any sense, and rarely want to; it's just icing on the cake when you find one who does.
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Goblin Squad Member
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If a griefer knows this could be the rest of his existence in PFO, to get spammed with bounties, it should make them think twice about killing for no reason.
Or, they will jsut take it out into the open where theres no law.
Did Ryan mention if there will be a sort of statute of limitations on a murder? Is there going to be a time limit on how long you cant go back to 'society'?
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Goblin Squad Member
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I can only hope that, should I fail to communicate well, that others would at least show me the courtesy of letting me clarify myself, rather than betting the farm that I really meant what I poorly said the first time.
I often find myself doing this when I think someone else is saying something that seems out of character or just totally off the wall.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Did Ryan mention if there will be a sort of statute of limitations on a murder? Is there going to be a time limit on how long you cant go back to 'society'?
From the blog entry on 18 Jan:
Outside this immediate zone of total safety, the NPCs of the settlement will respond with a system we are calling "marshals." NPC marshals will respond to acts of aggression near their settlement by traveling to the location of the infraction and killing the aggressor...
... At the edges of the security zone, it may be possible for a swift assault to destroy a target and still give the attackers time to flee before the marshals arrive. Those attackers will still be flagged as criminals, and they may also suffer alignment shifts as a result of their actions. There will be a cooldown timer imposed as well, 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.
So there appears to be a cool-down on the marshals, but it's unclear if that cooldown also applies to the criminal flag (ie, no fast travel, NPCs might not trade with you(?) ) and the bounty flag (the target of an illegal kill can do endless bounties).
If there were no cool-down on the criminal flag... that would mean a permanent loss of fast travel, right? That might be a bit too hardcore. But if the criminal flag were a month, real time, I'd be fine with it.
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Goblin Squad Member
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So there appears to be a cool-down on the marshals, but it's unclear if that cooldown also applies to the criminal flag (ie, no fast travel, NPCs might not trade with you(?) ) and the bounty flag (the target of an illegal kill can do endless bounties).
If there were no cool-down on the criminal flag... that would mean a permanent loss of fast travel, right? That might be a bit too hardcore. But if the criminal flag were a month, real time, I'd be fine with it.
I would say based on common sense, and the general style of the posts, I would think it is reasonable to think that the fast travel penalty will be short term, most probably hours or possibly just location. Without better knowlege of the fast travel system, I think it is plausible that it will be location based, IE each hex or town will have a point you can fast travel from/to. Having a criminal flag will render you unable to fast travel too or from the lawful high security areas in which you are a criminal in, are off limits to fast travel too or from.
Please note on my language, when I say plausible, reasonable to think etc... I am directly admitting these are educated guesses, not confirmed facts.
I actually do recall something along the lines of it is possible that regular repeated offenses could permanantly flag you, and render your character kill on sight in lawful NPC patrolled areas and unable to fast travel to/from them.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I agree that it's guesswork at this stage.
From other games, I'd suggest that a short-term (hours) penalty for willful activities like theft and murder in high-sec zones might not be much of a deterrent. With a flag of less than a day, the edgy people might just commit murders before logging out for the evening.
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Goblin Squad Member
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People make up their minds about what you say based on what you say. If you meant something else, how are they to make their minds up about what you want them to rather than about what you actually said? Yes, communication has to work well both ways, so it's a good start to give the other side something accurate to work with. The Dunning Kruger effect applies to those who think they are, but are not.
Using the two way street analogy, there are those who signal they are going to turn right, but then turn left. It makes no sense to lecture the guy who chose to drive straight through the intersection about how he made his mind up about what the guy in the left-signalling vehicle meant. Of course he did. When you are focused more on what you mean, and less on what others see you communicating, it is precisely what is meant in the Dunning Kruger effect by "the miscalibration of the incompetent stems from an error about the self". In other words focusing inwardly on what was meant, rather than outwardly on what was done.
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Goblinworks Executive Founder
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Communication starts when one party has a concept they want to share, and ends when that person no longer thinks that sharing that concept is a worthwhile endeavor.
Just because words are the intermediary step which is easiest to record and transmit doesn't mean words have objective meaning; determining what was meant by the speaker IS the role of the listener, not determining the meaning of the words used.
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Goblin Squad Member
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So long as it doesn't require telepathy.
It's my job as a driver to signal left if I actually mean to go left. The job of the other drivers is indeed to interpret my left blinking signal as an intention to go left. It most certainly is not their role to figure out that I actually mean right or straight. They can react and correct their own course if I suddenly change what I'm doing, but that doesn't make their previous expectations false - it makes my message false.
The sender of the message needs to put just as much care into their message as they expect to be put into interpreting it. Yes, there are two sides that both have an important role, but the second side can fulfill their role only after the first side has done a proper job with theirs. It simply isn't possible for the receiver to fulfill their role if the sender isn't doing theirs well enough. They can try and add context, and try to make reasonable assumptions, but in the end they're still relying on a minimal level of competency from the sender.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I think by "outside of factional PvP", what he meant to say was "unlawful PvP".
My post was addressed at both. Having played these kinds of games before I have found that griefers/general bandits will always find a way to skirt around the rules and take part in unsavory activities in a way that will not get them marked as a criminal. For instance fencing goods stolen by their bandit friends in lawful areas, or finding ways to get people to kill themselves (especially gullible people.)Often certain things that should probably be unlawful are not considered unlawful. For instance in Darkfall and Mortal Online you can shoot someone's mount out from under them or hop on it and ride off, but as long as you do not kill the actual player, you lose no alignment.
No matter how good the rules are, griefers will always find a way to beat the law. Personally I don't see this as a huge problem especially in a game based of DnD. If I am a chaotic good vigilante slaughtering lawful evil players it makes sense a bounty will be put on my head. It adds to roleplay and makes things more interesting.
I just take objection to the statement that no penalty is too high, and if you break the law it is clearly because you are a griefer. Penalties need to reasonable, chaotic good is a valid alignment.
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Goblinworks Executive Founder
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Again, if you are placing blame in a moral sense, you misunderstand communication.
If you active the right turn signal when you intend to indicate that you will go left, why? Your message isn't false- your message was encoded 'incorrectly'. (If you intended to indicate that you would turn right, but were going to turn left all along, your message would have been false, but 'properly' encoded)
The root cause of that hypothetical miscommunication lies in why you moved the lever up instead of down (or vice versa, in some countries).
When I drive I rarely use a blinking light as the sole source of information about another driver's intentions. That would be like using only semantics to evaluate the meaning of a written communication rather than considering syntax as well.
The final and perhaps most important step in communication is validation. If, as speaker, you feel that the listener has not understood your message, communicate that and clarify the message. As a listener, indicate what message you received, as by extending the concept in a clear manner, or rephrasing the concept in a manner that exposes a facet not covered by previous communication. Use caution to avoid duplicating encoding noise.
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Goblin Squad Member
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The final and perhaps most important step in communication is validation. If, as speaker, you feel that the listener has not understood your message, communicate that and clarify the message. As a listener, indicate what message you received, as by extending the concept in a clear manner, or rephrasing the concept in a manner that exposes a facet not covered by previous communication. Use caution to avoid duplicating encoding noise.
I agree with this a lot. I frequently see the original sender simply state that he has been misunderstood with absolutely no attempt to pinpoint why, or to clarify. I whole-heartedly agree with that.
Of course communication isn't the only barrier. On a rather personal note, some years ago I was going to a couples' therapist. I told him I was being a jerk to my wife, and that it was something that had not been so at all to start with. As I continued to explain the situation, he concluded that I was over exaggerating her tendencies to be controlling, domineering, and very closed to communication from me. He wanted me to start bringing her along. After two sessions he didn't want to speak to her anymore. He said he was wrong, that I had not exaggerated at all, but had rather painted a softer picture of her than reality. He said he never tells anyone to get divorced, but for me: either get a divorce or go insane with this woman.
Some people like to think there's a chance of reconciling with anyone, no matter what. I am convinced that some people are just varelse: "One of four Demosthean phrases of "otherness", varelse is of an extraterrestrial race with whom no communication or understanding is possible, and therefore war is often inevitable."
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Goblin Squad Member
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Be that as it may, there certainly is a considerable gap between the two as far as the topic of griefing is concerned.I think by "outside of factional PvP", what he meant to say was "unlawful PvP".My post was addressed at both...
The distinction is not important to the point that I am trying to make which is you do not need to be a griefer or bandit to kill blues. Whether it is because that person is pretending to be lawful while they are truely unlawful, or they are representing your faction in a dishonorable way is unimportant. The point is you weren't just killing them for kicks or for loot.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Yes, communication has to work well both ways, so it's a good start to give the other side something accurate to work with.
And if I fail to do that at the beginning, what is the next step?
I can try to clarify my original intent, but if it falls on deaf ears, and my listener refuses to believe anything other than his original interpretation of my original failure to communicate, what then?
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Goblin Squad Member
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Attempt to end the conversation, state you believe a fresh start is needed, state you feel you did not communicate your original intent clearly enough and wish to start over.
The receiver of the message can do the same thing when they realize there has been some confusion. Doesn't always work though: some people have a hard time publicly accepting they've made any kind of mistake at all.
Most you can do is try. Not trying is also an option. It doesn't do any harm to just let the other person keep going while you go find something else to occupy yourself with.
As someone trying to read the actual argument, can people arguing about how to argue please take it to the OTD? ^-^
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Goblin Squad Member
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But even then there was a profit motive... what is the profit motive in bounty griefing?
Step 1. Trick someone into killing you in lawful territory, since killing is the crime not looting they may as well loot if you are carrying anything. Net loss: Carried items (so assuming carrying nothing, equipment damage may be possible, but assuming not or assuming naked suicider, net gain 0)
Step 2. Place bounty: Net loss X gold for bounty
Step 3. Re place bounty: Net loss X gold for bounty
Goto step 3
You assume bounty griefers want loot. Maybe they just feed on qq, and loot is just the gravy.
Here's how it might work. Three characters, let's call them Niiman, DBCooper, and BlueWringer are in cahoots. Niiman hangs around the starter town, challenging new players to "a duel". It happens in every MMO, the duelist spam. Eventually, someone accepts and oh, Niiman happens to get killed. He puts a bounty out on his murderer, and designates DBCooper and BlueWringer as the bounty contractors. From then on, those two guys can attack the dupe at will. Then DBCooper spams duel invites until he lands a fish for Niiman and BlueWringer. Then BlueWringer finds a fool for the other two.
If you think that nobody would be stupid enough to fall for a duel set up... I don't know, I've seen some pretty foolish actions in MMOs.
How would I defeat the scenario above? I don't know how to automate it. I'd think that if a character has bounty claims against multiple characters (ie, one character has been illegally killed multiple times) that's a flag, but I don't know how to discern between a professional duel-loser and an unlucky bot.
Urman has a point. I can see someone offering to let folk "kill them", or the like, and there are likely plenty of newbies who'd fall for it. A good solution would be to explain bounties thoroughly ingame, though.
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Goblinworks Executive Founder
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If you think that nobody would be stupid enough to fall for a duel set up... I don't know, I've seen some pretty foolish actions in MMOs.How would I defeat the scenario above? I don't know how to automate it. I'd think that if a character has bounty claims against multiple characters (ie, one character has been illegally killed multiple times) that's a flag, but I don't know how to discern between a professional duel-loser and an unlucky bot.
Agreed duels aren't illegal? Or maybe agreed duels are illegal, in which case they aren't allowed to happen within the jurisdiction where murder is illegal?
Better yet, require a deposit on the bounty, non-refundable. Make new character, fall into 'duel trap', get bounty placed. Log out, create new character...
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Goblin Squad Member
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I think the crucial point missed by many in this discussion is that unlike in most traditional MMO systems, you don't earn the bounty just for killing the wanted target. You have to be ABLE to earn the bounty first.
A person walking around with a bounty on their head is not an ATM. If you're not someone chosen by the victim to collect the bounty, you can't attack the target with impunity and if the target dies you don't get any reward.
So there's no way for 2 people to "farm" the bounties (unless the victim is dumb enough to keep paying out the bounty to the same character over and over and over again without thinking to investigate collusion).
I've no doubt that there will be clearly superior options to "random dudes" available very quickly. Good, honest bounty hunters will be in high demand and the best will have little problem finding work.
The disincentive to griefing generated by the bounty will be the constant threat of being ganked. You'll have to worry, every time you log in, that there's a group of bounty hunters just waiting for you to give them an opportunity to take you out. The bounty hunters don't want a fair PvP fight - they want to swoop in, gank you, and get paid.
Of course as a griefer, you can simply choose to never go anywhere that would put your character at risk, but then you're not griefing anyone anymore either. The bounties create a situation where the "fun" things that griefers do are all one-shots, and that's just not very much fun (for them).
Imagine the scenario described above where a high-level griefer stands outside a settlement and kills newbs.
After one kill, that character is a criminal and can be safely killed by anyone without penalty. If the griefer returns for a second kill, the character is fair game for anyone to attack. Everyone who wants PvP can have PvP with that character without any fear. If the original victim put a bounty on that criminal's head, then the people trying to kill the criminal even get paid for their trouble. Lets say the criminal is really good at PvP and manages to kill a number of opponents. Those opponents are victims of murder and can assign bounties of their own. The more bounties accumulate, the more valuable the criminal becomes as a target for bounty hunters.
We have all seen the lengths that some folks will go to when "farming" a rare drop from a powerful NPC monster in a Theme Park game. A criminal who kills often will simply become a really valuable bit of the sandbox - something worth the effort to track, ambush, gank, and KEEP KILLING as long as the bounties are renewed.
Eventually, the character can't get anywhere near the newbs because every time they do, word spreads of their location and other characters looking for a fight, or looking to make their bones as "bounty hunters" come swarming.
Pretty soon the character finds their range of action limited to wilderness areas (and even there they live in constant fear). This is not a life a griefer will enjoy. The sheer "unfairness" of it all will drive them to quit rather than be subjected to it.
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Goblin Squad Member
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@Ryan They're not talking about doing it for the cash. I think you're completely missing the point. They're saying a really cheap bounty that you choose only your friend can collect and is something you can afford to pay over and over, is basically buying your friend a free pass to kill someone over and over anywhere they want to. We're talking so cheap that no one would bother to go out of their way to collect this bounty because they are not in it for the cash, but the killing.
They're not talking about griefers on the same end of justice you're talking about - they're talking about griefers fooling weaker players into that position on purpose so that they can then pursue and harass them ad nauseum.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Exactly, Blaeringr.
Upthread people stated that anti-griefing rules would be twisted and I was trying to provide a possible example of how griefers might attack other *players* by twisting or exploiting game mechanics, even sacrificing their own characters to do so.
I think Ryan's concept and sentiments are correct; the basic bounty rules should greatly reduce the PvP threat to players in the NPC controlled hexes. But there will be people who try to exploit it, that's the nature of these things.
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Goblin Squad Member
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It is very easy to not partake in unlawful pvp.
Ignorance is no excuse and you should never believe anything you read over the internet without verifying it for your self.
Ryan already said there would be a clear warning if you are about to attack someone unlawfully, and the only other thing i would add is an toggle-option to disable your ability to participate in unlawful actions, not allowing you to attack unlawfully, and either immediately kicking a criminal in your party, or instantly removing you from the group before you would be flagged as a contributor.
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Goblin Squad Member
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The problem i have with hardcore penalties on greifers is that there will inevitably be players who find themselves on a slippery slope even if they arent greifing. Example being character A is harassing character B in a non combat, no social way (creep stealing or some other such annoyance) player B retaliates to remove said player from his area by killing him, now he is a criminal. If the cool down on being a criminal is too long that player might find that he has to keep killing lawful players to survive. He wasnt intentionally being a jerk he just lost his temper with an annoying player. now he finds himself unable to go into towns for a month or however long it is, and players keep chasing him down.