think of it - .. i mean think of the priority of identification
right now we have :
1) ID
2) playerfaction tag
3) tag
4) ship/weapons
what you are asking for is swapping 1 and 2 around. in accordance with what we discussed about new york pvp. - ( remember immunity up to lvl30, exception is a faction ID ) - would that mean that it should then be "immunity up to 30, exception is a faction ID or a playerfaction tag"? or is the playerfaction tag in that situation not the primary concern of identification?
if the importance of the playerfaction tag and the ID switches regarding to the situation, it becomes complicated. while i agree that a playerfaction is a HUGE step towards willing to roleplay - a trader, no matter what is still a trader and is protected by the law/rules of tradeship. that means - as a gaian, i cannot blow up a trader, just cause he is BMM tagged, IDed and possibly belongs to a playerfaction that represents BMM ( not like there is one ). no.... i must ask him for tax ( possibly a little more maybe 1 million instead of 500k ) but still it must be reasonable.
ANYTHING ELSE is terrorism and violating the rules much much more than a trader financing enemy playerchars.
of course - a trader must stay in-role. so, yes - i can treat a trader with corsair ID and corsair tag and pirate train as an allmost hostile - but still as a trader. ( like the smuggler ) he must not dock at lawful bases but i must not blow him up unless he does something wrong. if i do - the trader has every right to complain about breaking the rules.
i find it brave and good if a trader is IDed close to those that he is financing - and tagged that way. as long as that character roleplays as one of this traderfactions vessels, its practicly the best you can do about it. so a trader that is financing the THB should indeed at least be TBH tagged / smuggler IDed; a trader financing the LSF should be LSF tagged, trader tagged. both would be limited to what the faction is limited. that means the THB trader would be allowed to smuggle from unlawful base to unlawful base, while the LSF would be allowed to do legal trading that benefits liberty ( for example newark / id-14 ) - its about setting yourself a limit in favour of roleplay, even if the IDs give you more freedom.
about zoners - i am at a complete loss why you think that zoners cannot be touched. i mean - really. there is nothing in the rules, and nothing about roleplay that says so ... rather the contrary. there are rumors on yaren for example that say something like "a zoner married a corsair woman, a total disgrace of the corsairs. so the brother of that woman will take her back to crete and kill the zoner." THAT is how zoners are treated.
all the rubbish about diplomatic immunity. zoners are very likely to be pirated and harrassed cause they are in contact with many. they wiggle out of most of it - but sometimes not. every zoner can be pirated, unless he has an agreement with the local forces ( including pirates and lawfuls alike... but guess what... its just like any other trader )
zoners are pissing off many people but have connections to dictate their actions to a certain amount. but if a juicy zoner trader full to the rim with valuable stuff comes across a pirate, - hell, have a go.... . ( just make sure you fix your zoner when you pirate zoners.... JUST like any other trader you pirate... if you pirate RepEx on a regular base, make sure you are red to repex )
edit: the above applies to both, lawfuls and unlawfuls. whoever shoots at a faction ( player ) on a regular base should make oneself red to that faction. when its about smuggling. zoners are not participating in unlawful activities by ID - BUT zoners do not consider artifacts / cardamine to be an unlawful action. or smuggling in general. ( see NPCs. they carry artifacts on a daily base ) - but if a houseforce shoots zoners down for smuggling all the time, there rep should reflect that.
Quote:about zoners - i am at a complete loss why you think that zoners cannot be touched. i mean - really. there is nothing in the rules, and nothing about roleplay that says so ... rather the contrary. there are rumors on yaren for example that say something like "a zoner married a corsair woman, a total disgrace of the corsairs. so the brother of that woman will take her back to crete and kill the zoner." THAT is how zoners are treated.
.. Problem with that is, you don't have many players willing to roleplay a submissive "victim."
The role you described above does sound more than proper for Zoners given their strictly neutral nature, but then again it's hard to say where the line really is. Zoners have a seemingly endless horde of combat-oriented ships in their production lines, including harbingers of death like Destroyers and (I think?) battleships and so on.
.. I don't think it makes any sense that Zoners would have these vessels, to be honest. There's only one instance where I can think of that a Zoner might be flying something like that, and that would be to fend off Nomads or somesuch. Still, I can't really think of any reason as to why Zoners would actively develop technology like that, especially given their loosely organized way of doing things. Just can't really see how they'd find the time (or the resources, let alone the knowhow) to design things like that, considering.
*Shrug*
.. These things seem to make people think that as a Zoner you're "freelance." This is why you sometimes see a Zoner tag Liberty Dreadnought or an Osiris in Liberty. It's silly, these characters should be deleted, 'cause odds are if you've got a Zoner IFF (let alone a capitol ship), you've been playing long enough to where you should know better. If I had it my way, as a Zoner you wouldn't be flying anything larger than a Bomber unless it was a tradeship.
As for traders.. Well..
I'm of the personal opinion that money transferring (or "muling") should not be allowed. It could be prevented easily. I think it's bad for the roleplaying atmosphere fundamentally. For one, there are absolutely no consequences in roleplay here, anywhere. If you gain an enemy, the best he can do is kill you, and you won't lose credits other than ammo and what you don't have equipped. I think you should at least have to rebuy your ship, seriously. You're a terrorist, you say? Woah, you got that nice flashy ID but even still the only thing I can do is shoot you, and then watch you respawn to return for your vengeance like they always do even though roleplay wise you should die eventually..
I think the economy in general is way too easy aswell, also. A newbie will pay 20 million for a CODENAME weapon (shame on those of you who charge that much, and double-shame on those of you who farm those wrecks and force those newbies to pay that much) and it only serves to make life easier for the rich, while being harder for the poor. Makes sense I guess, except that the armories who usually sell these weapons are usually always ooRP themselves.
None of them ever left New York when the safe zone was up, and now they'll never leave Manhattan it seems like. Which is odd considering, as I seriously doubt that in a proper setting that Liberty would allow for weapons merchants to sit right on it's front porch, especially seeing as to how they don't pay taxes and are selling allegedly "rare" and "foreign" technologies. Not to mention, you'll never see these armories going out to get the CODENAMEs themselves, but instead you'll see a Zoner Cruiser or something along those lines bringing resupply to the Armory..
This is bad for numerous reasons, one of which being that again, there are no consequences for what should be a very dangerous, explosive market. Not to mention these players always farm the wrecks, causing there to be a monstrous surplus of CODENAME weaponry everywhere, available for all (which I shouldn't really complain, as I'm a CODIE whore, I guess).
Overall, I think static Armories are abit lame, I think trade routes give way too much loot in comparison to time spent, and "muling" from character-to-character will always be bad for RP because if you do something bad as a character and someone tries to enforce consequences on you as a result, if the player in question doesn't like being held responsible all he has to do is roll up a new character and by default it's just the same as his last, causing the infamous "1 pilot per thousands of ships" syndrome that we all know and love so very much (I'm also guilty of this I think, since I have 1 character who flies three separate LSF fighters - I only do this though for different weapon setups, and to have a personal scout LF).
.. If you're trading by yourself with no funding from other sources (players), then I think it should take you some obscene amount of time to trade your way up to a Battleship (for example). It should take like one year. This adds continuity to the game, and forces players to work together more often. You would see factions rallying to obtain credits, much like what you saw back in the 60's during the space race between the US and Russia. Until you sacrifice abit of your "run n' gun action" for depth and intrigue, I don't think Discovery will ever get the sort of roleplay it's community aims towards.
i ll write an example about zoners - cause i just experienced it:
i was on Cheshire ( bounty hunter ID / Tag /ship etc ). scanned a [zoner] (no tag, its a player name tag ) and found - not to my surprise ... 4800 cardamine in sigma-13. i asked him to stop - he jumps to frankfurt. i jump behind him - ask him to stop again. ( sadly, i just swapped my train CD for a razor, cause i thought i wouldn t do much trader hunting anymore, but rather combat assistance ) - he does not answer.
he heads into that crystal / minefield whatever it is. of course he does not really fit through - and is slowed down severely. i tell him to drop the cargo or be destroyed.. he answered "by whom". ( for my char, thats enough reason to stop discussing ).
short story - the zoner whale gets destroyed and the evidence was taken to new berlin police base ( giving me a little profit form it )
from his escape pod i get a message "vengeance will be swift and quick" or something. well, i ignore such things. it makes little difference if all pirate factions hate you - or more than all pirate facitons.
zoners are lawful, but they smuggle. however, if they are caught it makes no difference if they are zoners or traders. besides - i don t like it much when people tag themselves with an NPC tag.
the consequence is that i make a report with evidence on the RM message board. and the lawful forces will have an eye on those zoners. but i would have done the very same, regardless of the trader ID ( cooperation, trader or zoner )
thats how i see zoners ( from both points of view - as jinx ( zoner ) aswell as cheshire ( BHG )
about capital ships:
they are meant to defend zoner installations - not meant to fly in the core systems or travel around. they are mostly hidden - and used to scare more than fight.
about armories / weapon dealers:
i don t know about those - it makes no sense. they sell weapons - but people must not use them. so it is possible for a newbie to buy a kraken type 2 from an armory - but he ll get sanctioned for ooRP when he is not outcast - so whats the point of the armory then. ( concerning those armories that sell the stuff, not those that keep it for their faction )
but it was about immunity of tags / factions....
no faction is immune. if a faction acts wrong, it becomes a valid target. the approach on different factions is differently. of course a BHG approaches a zoner in a more civil tone than a corsair smuggler. but the intention is the same: prevent crime ( and maybe get a good share out of it )
The story behind the Destroyer is a multi task vessel. Tasks are escorting Zoner convoys (I think yes they can be pirated), defending Zoner stations, delivering important goods to stations in hostile space (Delta for example) and exploration. Why all this? The Juggernaught is a battleship and to huge. Its size is a disadvantage for being flexible.
Because of the almost neutral state of Zoners i have made the destroyer not uber, by giving it 9 instead of 12 turrets.
I have my transport with corsair tag and corsair ID. It is an independent corsair atm and i would not complain, if an enemy of corsairs will blow me, because i don't like hiding behind some protective rules. Thats the way of an corsairs life. It makes the runs more fun, because the risk is higher.
agree with AoM. in the end, its the role you play - and its most fun when you play the role with all sides - the bad ones aswell as the good ones. being attacked by an outcast when you are a corsair is just what you WANT if you play a corsair. hiding behind a rule is ... unnatural and strange for the role you wish to play. but its mostly the player himself that lowers his fun of "role"playing.
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