Fletcher is right, imagine newcomers to this server. They read (basic) rules and they go to RP Merc, they RP it nice and then bang sanction because they didn't read wall-of-textish rules about Mercenaries and Bounty Board.
I think most of you know or knew Clayph. When I spoke with him about Disco and why he doesn't play it anymore he said: I want to roleplay what I want. Not being forced to follow thousands of rules which are cutting my RP. I see his point now. Every year, every mod, we are getting new and new rules and roleplay is being sized to stereotypical box. What will these rule help? Yeah it will stop few PVP whores, but make life harder for hundreds of another players. Don't take it I'm whining, Q_Qing or babycrying. Please think about it.
Is it really necessary to overcomplicate things in such a gross fashion? We're playing a spaceship shooter game. While it is completely possible to have roleplay without PvP, these occasions are rare and often pre-organized between players that already know each other; when it comes down to it, PvP is an essential part of almost all our interactions here. So, you got killed by a Merc. How is it different to being killed by a Rogue, or an Outcast, or a Nomad?
One reason why I dislike the whole ID system is that I feel it to be terribly contraproductive towards creating a unique, open roleplaying environment. Now, I realize that with a playerbase such as Disco's, we need some restrictions to prevent things from descending into utter chaos. But why can't we approach the problem from another direction?
Allow people to roleplay - but enforce some common sense and make people feel the consequences of their actions. I'd suggest something like roleplay moderators and permanent kills, but people'd probably cry upon losing their underage lesbian battleship commanders and Zone 21 smugglers, so meh. We need to deal with the troublemakers in person, rather than placing blanket restrictions under which everybody wishing to do some more unique RP than "u got bounty, u dai" or "lol, 2millordai" is severally restricted in his endeavors.
' Wrote:Seven and Twelve contradict one another. Which is somewhat confounding.
Official factions, pre-arranged. Twelve covers other situations. (Or, that is what I am guessing.)
' Wrote:9 means that if we want to know who sponsored a bounty that you are posting on their behalf, you have to tell us.
12 means that I can't post "5 million bounty on all Junkers. Collectible only by my faction/friends/me". A player or faction sponsoring a bounty cannot post a bounty simply to provide themslevs with an excuse to shoot people.
The red word I added into your post was added correctly? (Because otherwise, I am still lost.)
So, I can collect my bounty on all official faction miners, as long as it is open? (As it has been for most of the time.)
Is the any reason that we cant have an unlawful Bounty Hunter id, and change the entire manner in which bounties are thought of?
It seems to me that the majority of Mercs that are flying around claiming the blanket bounties from Corsairs et al are nothing more than unlawful Bounty Hunters?
Looking at the info cards seems to suggest that there is not a tremendous amount of difference between the 2 ids either.
Bounty Hunters can do the following ;-
1. Can fulfil lawful bounty contracts
2. Can trade and escort traders
3. Can demand cargo and credits from ships carrying contraband and destroy them if the refuse to comply
4. Cannot ally with any unlawfuls
5. Cannot participate in any unlawful actions
6. Cannot use and transports with more than 4300 cargo
7. Allowed ships ;- Fighters, Freighters, Transports, Gunboats, Prison liners.
Mercs on the other hand can do the following ;-
1 Can trade and escort traders
2 Can fulfil lawful and unlawful bounty contracts
3 Cannot pirate, but can provide security services for pirates who are pirating if paid to do so. Mercenaries can only fire on traders or smugglers in self defence or if the trader of smuggler fires on or is bountied by the mercenaries employer.
4 Cannot use any transports with more than 3800 cargo
5 Allowed ships ;- Fighters, Freighters, Transports, Gunboats
Looking at the similarities you have to start to wonder why there are 2 ids at all based on the manner in which most Merc ids seem to be used at the moment (by many players).
Items 1 and 2 are effectively the same difference for both.
Items 3 for both of them is very similar. For instance if a BH comes across an cardamine smuggler its nice and easy. Cardamine is considered unlawful, and as such the BH is well within his rights (according to the info card) to do something about it.
In the case of a Merc it has now become normal for Mercs to apply to unlawful factions for permission to access their bounty boards. Once they have been granted this access then they are effectively employed by the Bounty Board owner (or so it seems to me).
In the case of the Corsairs there is a list included in the Corsair laws of Contraband commodities. Based on this list, what is to stop the Corsair associated Merc from stopping traders carrying any of the items listed as contraband and behaving in exactly the same way as the Bounty Hunter?
Item 4 for the BH is fairly self explanatory, and in truth the same applies to a Merc that has been accepted and granted access to an unlawfuls bounty board. Any Merc found to be shooting at Corsairs having been accepted onto their bounty board will find themselves in trouble with the Corsairs. The only difference with this is that the Merc is expected to be honest and not go shoot at his employers, and it is therefore not a server rule.
Item 5 for the BH is something that I have had a bit of an issue with for a long time. It has everything to do with the definition of unlawful. Whilst I accept that from a game mechanics perspective the way it is currently considered works, it still irritates me to think that a bounty can be completed in a lawful houses space where the person to whom the bounty is applicable is not actually a criminal. The local law enforcement agencies tend (with but few exceptions) to sit around and let what is effectively little more than a licensed civilian, destroy the ship of a law abiding citizen (in that locality). Anyhow, that it what it is, and not the real point of this topic or reply.
So the BH cant participate in unlawful activity. Mercs can participate in unlawful activity if they are employed by unlawfuls.
Since, I personally have never seen either a Merc or a BH transport I am not sure how relevant item 6 for the BH and item 4 for the Mercs is, and in terms of these discussions Id say it is not relevant at all.
Finally, the ship types are pretty much the same difference.
So if we simply created an Unlawful Bounty Hunter id they would effectively have all of the same abilities etc as a lawful one but simply from a different perspective. Same set of rules applies to both groups, but with different affiliations.
So those are my arguments for having a new id for Unlawful Bounty Hunters since it is my view that there is not really a tremendous amount of difference in terms of how the ids are actually used (although I accept that the Merc id may have been created with a different idea in mind).
However, I have now got another issue. What to do with Mercs? Big houses/corporations would be likely to employ Mercs to augment and reinforce their standing armies.
I am now about to contradict some of the things I have stated above. But since this is meant to be an open discussion I might as well throw it all out there and let you guys think about the solution.
My issue concerns the nature of the Blanket Bounties as opposed to Individual Bounties that relate to a single or at the most a small group of individuals.
The blanket bounties tend to be offered by Houses/factions, both lawful and unlawful, and they tend to be applicable to that groups enemies.
To my mind the blanket bounties are much more applicable to Mercs than to Bounty Hunters. It seems perfectly logical that Mercs that are employed by a House/faction would be out there killing that groups enemies, whilst Bounty Hunters, by their nature, would be chasing people that have been declared as criminals by those offering the bounty.
Because of this differential Id be inclined to stop Bounty Hunters completing blanket bounties, and only allow Mercs to do them. But Id prevent Mercs from taking the Individual Bounties that might be offered.
This does however rather reduce the number of things that Bounty Hunters have to do, since they currently spend a lot of their time completing blanket bounties.
Some of what Ive outlined would also be likely to resolve some of the issues relating to having a requirement to make your target red on your scanner, since it will mean that the IFF can be more sensibly manipulated accordingly depending on whom it is that you are affiliated with.
Anyhow. Those are my thoughts I know that they are not the complete solution, but do feel that they at least address some of the issues feel free to contradict or otherwise.
' Wrote:I want to roleplay what I want. Not being forced to follow thousands of rules which are cutting my RP.
Except that a comment like this is something that was already mentioned. You don't want to role-play, you just want to play-play. First I was an astronaut, then I was a cowboy, then I finished up as a swashbuckler. That's playing pretend, not actually role-playing.
You know what? None of these things are preventing you from role-playing a darned thing. What they ARE doing is simply setting up some rules for everyone that help define the role. There are always rules to every game.
Oh, and guess what? This codification of these rules is something that we bounty hunters basically already do. I know ProwlerPC and others have made this comment in the past - we have spreadsheets, notebooks, and other things around to keep track of who we can shoot, and where. That's what made blanket bounties so helpful - you're a corsair in Bretonia, I can hunt you down. No more having to look around to see if Sails|Jorge was on a list somewhere as a criminal, and then seeing it was Sails|George that was on the list so that if I went after Jorge I was going to get sanctioned for PvP abuse.
(11-21-2013, 12:53 PM)Jihadjoe Wrote: Oh god... The end of days... Agmen agreed with me.
So now all bounty hunters, mercs and freelancer and whoever else hunts for bounties needs to accept a bounty by making a post in the proper bounty board.
For example if I want to work for liberty.
I need to make a post in the republic of liberty bounty board.
Correct?
Will there be a list where all names of the characters that can claim bounties about the specific bounty board.
What I mean is that when you made a post in the republic of liberty board I get added in a list at the first post of employees or something?
And if you are with the BHG (Just ID not the faction) will you be automatically be able to work in all places the bounty hunters guild works? And you don't need to make a post about your character that wants to work for the specific bounty?
Since you are with the faction this seems reasonable right?
If I can get a little confirmation about this I'm a happy men
i think the admin team have done a brilliant job on the matter of chiseling the unwritten laws of bounty hunters and server moral into the commandments of the server.
I fullheartedly support this change, though i disagree slighly one some matters they are fair. Thus, they are justified as a way to keep server gameplay and the general fun of the server intact. A wise move.
' Wrote:Except that a comment like this is something that was already mentioned. You don't want to role-play, you just want to play-play. First I was an astronaut, then I was a cowboy, then I finished up as a swashbuckler. That's playing pretend, not actually role-playing.
I don't get it how is this connected to what I said. I there are people roleplaying Crazy mutant kitties or mutant lizard or insane guys from alien civilization, I don't see why I'm play-playing when I want to RP Merc which works for people who pay.
Quote:You know what? None of these things are preventing you from role-playing a darned thing. What they ARE doing is simply setting up some rules for everyone that help define the role. There are always rules to every game.
I would like to know how is it helping to define my role. I don't need bunch of rules to define my role. I was playing here in 4.84 and I must say RP was at same level or maybe better than now. And there weren't two dozen of rules.
Quote:Oh, and guess what? This codification of these rules is something that we bounty hunters basically already do. I know ProwlerPC and others have made this comment in the past - we have spreadsheets, notebooks, and other things around to keep track of who we can shoot, and where. That's what made blanket bounties so helpful - you're a corsair in Bretonia, I can hunt you down. No more having to look around to see if Sails|Jorge was on a list somewhere as a criminal, and then seeing it was Sails|George that was on the list so that if I went after Jorge I was going to get sanctioned for PvP abuse.
Well I agree with this ...
and I agree with these changes also except
Quote:Payers must be hostile to the faction they are targetting in a bounty. This does not apply to assassination missions where the target is a single character.
' Wrote:Who you are hostile to will depend on who to intend killing. If you intend to kill all of the above, you should be hostile to them. A more convenient way to adjust reputations is desirable, but just as, say a Guard ID'd player has to go through hours of missions to acquire his reputation, you will have to persevere.
Or, as others have suggested:
Just do missions (when they are available) until all the factions show FULL red. Then it'll take forever to get green - Virus
How the hell do you think the rest of us do it ? It's hard work unfortunately. And with the new mod, it's a
little harder again ... It ain't about your being able to kill everything with ease, it's about thinking about your rep, and not just landing places because you can. Its sticking to our RP rules as they are, not as you see convenient - Hoodlum
But again you ignore what I say and just repeat the rule. The rule, simply put, makes no sense. It's akin to shooting 20 bank employees before going off to rob the bank. A crime doesn't exist in the eyes of the law until it is reported, and if no one reports it, the mercenary should get off with a successful pat on the back and a richer wallet. A player getting guard rep has no bearing on this at all because the person is setting up as a Navy/Corsair/Whatever character. They have picked a faction, mercenaries by logic follow credits. Furthermore, mercenaries by comparison would strive to be as unnoticeable as possible so they could accomplish their goals, and make a quick escape, rather than proudly show off their new cruiser.
For the record I haven't logged onto my MercNet merc to do any MercNet contracts in well over a month. The massive amounts of forum Q_Q because people had their pixels blown up by a merc is enough to drown out vuvuzelas when South Africa scored. Instead of the same people doing what they should have done - engaged in forum RP, reported those who are killing lawful targets unlawfully - they whined and moaned, which resulted in mercenaries being considered no-RP PvP-whores.
But what Tycho said is right. My legs are getting wet and oddly warm.
' Wrote:About the rep matching actions thing. Here's my perspective on the issue. This lists all the MercNet bounties. In order to claim any of the bounties at an opportunistic time, I have to make my rep hostile with:
- Blood Dragons
- Golden Chrysanthemums
- Unioners
- Red Hessians
- Freelancers
- Junkers
- Corsairs
- Outcasts
- Bounty Hunters
- All of Bretonia
- Liberty corporations, which will pretty much make Liberty inhospitable
- Lane Hackers
- IMG
And because of the retarded way Freelancer handles reputation, this will affect so many factions that you do not want to target that the only base you'll be able to land on will be Freeports. Besides, its not really hard for the victim of a kill to do a little RP and forum interaction (something you are encouraging bounty collectors to do) and alert the authorities of a mercenary going around shooting people. Carlos the Jackal evaded capture for years. Are we so unimaginative to the point where in the distant future deceiving the law is impossible? You know, fake identification, forging ship registries, etc?
As Virus asked, will CD'ing nearby NPCs be enough, or are we making rules based upon the actions of those that don't follow them anyway?
That list is the very first reason I discouraged the MMs from getting into MercNet.
For amazing as it sounds, I got people telling me "what? I have to post my kills now?", like it wasn't like that before.
Quote:A crime doesn't exist in the eyes of the law until it is reported, and if no one reports it, the mercenary should get off with a successful pat on the back and a richer wallet
So, if you are robbing a bank, and the camera is recording you doing it, the police can't do anything to you until someone reports you?
So, if you are shooting a Liberty Navy ship, and the ship is in communication with the Liberty Navy Command, the Liberty Navy can't do anything to you until that officer reports you?
![[Image: hG0lGaj.png]](https://i.imgur.com/hG0lGaj.png)
![[Image: v1zVWKX.png]](https://i.imgur.com/v1zVWKX.png)
