3.1 All contracts and bounties must be justified within roleplay and conform to IDs. A character may be hired ingame or on the forum by non-generic IDed (non Freelancer, Pirate, or Miner) players, for a minimum of 1 million credits per target. Targets must be informed of the contract/bounty originator before the attack and be able to verify the veracity of it. The reputations of employer and employee must be neutral or friendly to each other, and they must both be hostile to the target unless they're enforcing Official Faction Rights or the target has a generic ID.
[+]Info
3.2 Bounties enacted while the employer is offline, PvP-dead, or farther than one system away must be posted in the "Bounty Offices" sub-forum. The forum thread must specify the employer's name and affiliation, and also specify and verify the affiliation of those who may claim the bounty. A limited payout number, expiry date, or exclusivity to pre-registered bounty board members may be specified beforehand. Players may not hire exclusively their own characters.
I meant to drop a comment a while back on this.
My only concern is that under this current wording, you can hire BG's for assassinations basically, in game, without a post, if the target is still only a system away. I'm still a supporter of needing to be within sight of who you're targeting if hiring a bounty hunter to take them out. Otherwise, a ship pirates a guy, flies off, the next system over the trader finds a BH, says go kill him, then the pirate is doing his thing and a BH shows up, give you hell. But in those cases, it is basically like getting away without having to post the bounty. The only way I'd support that wording is if we are clear that such things are the point. To me though, we should probably keep it as it was, and require a post unless the hiring is done with all parties present. That wouldn't extend to blanket bounties of course.
While on the topic, I'd also suggest that we consider, if its not technically 'allowed', changing the individual bounty system so that bounty hunters need to try to collect the posted bounty first. So if someone bounties a ship for 10 million, the BH's/merc would need to demand that 10 million from the target, and only engage if they aren't willing to pay. And of course that would not count in blanket bounty cases, since the point of them is usually to clear the way for BH's/mercs to help out military factions in combat. Assassinations would still be possible, but it seems it would need to be sponsored by an official faction, as they can add really bad individuals to their bounty board. I know this isn't about big changes but if/when rules get updated, if that were supported, getting it in the rules would be good.
My last comment is with regards to inrp demands. My only concern is that we make sure that roleplay demands CAN be met, and aren't ridiculous and never ending. Just like 1 demand of cargo or credits per encounter, once you demand a ship do a dance or leave your territory, that's it for that one.