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[Pvp improvement] Wanted and mercenary system


Nefasto

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TL;DR
A bounty/mercenary system seems a way to improve PVP, granting more balanced PVP actions and less grind. Please, before saying "go to PVE", "raided" and stuff read it all.

Hello everybody!
This is my second and last attempt to point out the problem.
Servers and forums are getting a bit empty (ok except last few days), lots of friends who were playing Ark quitted, only the big "December announce" (End game content?) seems the way to consolidate Ark once for all.
Honestly I'm a bit worried about Ark's future, but at the same time I see "small" fixes that may improve the game dramatically; maybe they are already under testing, or at least I hope so.

Since the recent cross server transfers, the endless problem of pvp "griefing" has become almost unbearable.
Cross server transfer is a great idea because improves gameplay, thanks to bigger worlds and more player interactions, but the current game mechanics promotes only the most brutal players (more than ever).
We all know that the pvp balancing aspect is not as good as it should be, especially for new/casual players and small tribes: endless topics, tons of abbandoned broken homes in pvp servers, communities demolished by massive tribes invaders are daily routine.
It's great to be the winner destroying the opponent, but as Ark says, "only the stronger will survive", leaving all others behind.
Survival pvp players will say that this is as it should be: sure, but this trend it's impossible to mantain because people leave the game and soon or later pvp will be reduced to nothing (bored alpha on their throne, I tried that more than once).

Meanwhile, this idea (vanilla game or mod) might help both experienced pvp players and new/casual pvp players, granting more balanced pvp action and a revenge chance to everybody.

[Wanted system]
The most dangerous players should be wanted. Wanted level should be based on pvp actions in game. Whoever executes the wanted player should have a prize. Wanted mark is based on player ID.

[Features]
1) All PVP players (or tribes) can be wanted, wanted level is based on kills/thefts/sabotages etc.
2) Some sort of billboard should show the list of wanted players ranked by reward and danger.
3) Who (tribe or player) executes/captures/castigates the outlaw(s), should receive the bounty reward (or part of it based on the impact of the action); accordingly the wanted level should be reduced, and below a threshold removed.

4) Everybody can put a bounty on someone else, paying out of pocket.
 4.1) Should require a small price or restriction.

5) The bounty should be generated by the game and based on the wanted's actions, this also reduces a bit the "grind".
 5.1) Bounty consists on materials, blueprints, eggs, creatures, generated and/or picked from the stuff killed/destroyed by the wanted.
 5.2) Bounty should be richer if claimed by the avenger.

6) If the outlaw(s) persists on his actions the bounty should increase exponentially.
7) The bounty should be claimed at the obelisk/drop or on execution.
 7.1) If someone steals the bounty should become ultra wanted (if using public spots).

8) Betraying teammates gives a long term wanted status.
9) As exploits countermeasures (cross tribe rewards etc), adjusted coefficients, timers and Steam ID based wanted levels should be applied.


Pros
1) Pvp players will have other pvp players to worry about!
2) Can't hide behind animosity anymore. New players will be encouraged to continue their adventure knowing that griefers are not immune (also in PVE?).
3) Wanted mark could become a status symbol, the server's/world's most wanted player could be prized with skins etc.
4) Economy should take advantage; merceraries, factions could be encouraged. You should be able to survive working only as a bounty hunter.
5) Possible to know if a player has a bad reputation (before inviting in tribe etc), but stands to you judge him!
6) part of the loss can be reintegrated.
7) Suits that new "strategizing" topic in SurviveTheArk.
8) Can be an on/off option.
9) Less work for moderators.


Cons
1) Exploits to monitor (lots).
2) Could be complex to develop if item based.
3) How to judge self-defence? Shouldn't become a lawyer game.
4) Must be consistent: could break game immersion or change game aspects in unpredictable ways.
5) Could lead to server fragmentation.

I would make it myself as a mod, but my connection is too slow to download the devkit in a useful time, tried already, takes a month->gets updated and resets.
Thanks for reading and share other ideas! ːsteamhappyː

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There will be always some angry kids who will destroy everything, in anyway, "just for fun". Last one I've seen is throw of wild allosaurus into players fences, killing all their dino. Why the guy has do that ? It doesn't add him xp, as it was wild allosaurus, he just do that because he's stupid and he think fun = destroy, and he will not be recorded on tribe log. Unfortunately, there are plenty of players like that. All you can do is to improve your defenses, until a massive attack of thoses guys, as they are numerous they tend to do tribes with themselves.

 

A better solution will be pvp protection for new players and some level comparison (a player 200+ can not raid a 100-), but it will not change that some dumbs will throw allosaurus on your base. Maybe a better policy, to detect this kind of practices.

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22 hours ago, LinuxGyver said:

There will be always some angry kids who will destroy everything, in anyway, "just for fun". Last one I've seen is throw of wild allosaurus into players fences, killing all their dino. Why the guy has do that ? It doesn't add him xp, as it was wild allosaurus, he just do that because he's stupid and he think fun = destroy, and he will not be recorded on tribe log. Unfortunately, there are plenty of players like that. All you can do is to improve your defenses, until a massive attack of thoses guys, as they are numerous they tend to do tribes with themselves.

 

A better solution will be pvp protection for new players and some level comparison (a player 200+ can not raid a 100-), but it will not change that some dumbs will throw allosaurus on your base. Maybe a better policy, to detect this kind of practices.

Thats why the idea of the bounty system: you can do whatever you want in the game, just like now, but if you harass everybody you'll have consequences. I call it a win/win.

 

 

 

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I'm all for a bounty system but consider EvE Online (I reference it allot as its a great case study for how people react in online games with few rules)

They implemented bounties in EvE but people just figured out that you could have a friend kill you to collect the reward and then split it with you (especially since there is really no consequences of dying)

They updated the system a while back though where instead, you receive a reward based on the cost of things you destroyed owned by the bountied person.

So for instance, (incoming made up numbers) A lvl 100 rex is worth 1000 metal ingots. Rex owner has a 500 metal ingot bounty. You and a friend kill his rex, the payout is 10% of the rex cost (so that's 100 ingots) spread across 2 people. That means each of you get a 50 ingot credit. Rex owner bounty is now down to 400 metal ingots as 100 ingots were payed out.

This keeps the rex owner's friends from killing his rex as it probably isn't as profitable to have the 100 ingots vs the lvl 100 rex.

So if you were going to introduce some kind of bounty system, it would probably have to be like mentioned above to dissuade abuse.

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1 hour ago, Jrminot said:

I'm all for a bounty system but consider EvE Online (I reference it allot as its a great case study for how people react in online games with few rules)

They implemented bounties in EvE but people just figured out that you could have a friend kill you to collect the reward and then split it with you (especially since there is really no consequences of dying)

They updated the system a while back though where instead, you receive a reward based on the cost of things you destroyed owned by the bountied person.

So for instance, (incoming made up numbers) A lvl 100 rex is worth 1000 metal ingots. Rex owner has a 500 metal ingot bounty. You and a friend kill his rex, the payout is 10% of the rex cost (so that's 100 ingots) spread across 2 people. That means each of you get a 50 ingot credit. Rex owner bounty is now down to 400 metal ingots as 100 ingots were payed out.

This keeps the rex owner's friends from killing his rex as it probably isn't as profitable to have the 100 ingots vs the lvl 100 rex.

So if you were going to introduce some kind of bounty system, it would probably have to be like mentioned above to dissuade abuse.

I imagine even that would be abusable, given how tames and the like work in ARK - you could just tame yourself a ton of Lystros at high levels, throw them in someone's yard to be killed, then come back later and destroy all their stuff for bounty prizes.

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True, Nothing would be abuse proof, but in your example, it's pretty easy to give Lystros a very low "cost" as everyone knows they are neither valuable nor difficult to tame. The "cost" doesn't necessarily have to be statically based off of creature level but would need to take into account creature utility, and/or difficulty in taming, and/or difficulty in killing.

So someone would have to sit down and assign each dino and structure a "cost" and then scale it for levels in the case of dinos.

Even level scaling cost between different dinos could be different.

For example, a lvl 150 wild tamed lysto isn't that much better than a lvl 1 wild tamed lystro (in my opinion). So a Lystro may be anywhere from 30-50 metal ingots.

A Rex cost would scale allot more I would imagine. Something like 1000-2000 ingots depending on level.

 

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@Jrminot

Great mention. I summarized all the branch with "exploits".
I think it's the bigger problem in a bounty system.

@zacmanthedamned

Indeed, but a Lystro wouldn't have such value.The bounty should be less than the lost goods: you will never gain something if you are (or allied with) the side who sacrifice something to obtain bounties. All the system would need lots of testing (as @Jrminot shows), but nothing impossible.

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I think adding a lot of structure to PvP is getting away from the spirit of the game. As everyone has pointed out, this bounty system would require arbitration by a judge to determine the value of tames, which is bad. Values are set by players deciding what they want based on how they play, and it should remain that way. To many people, a lystro is a waste of time, but maybe someone else places a high level on them because they have a lystro petting zoo. (idk). Anyway, I think that a better improvement to PvP lies in the following steps:

  1. Reduce the grind. It should not take hours and hours to construct a wooden base. The grind should be exponentially lower for lower tiers.
  2. Increase strength of walls, decrease strength of doors/gates/windows. Make offline defense based more on the way in which the base is set up, funneling attackers into firing zones/traps/mazes etc.
  3. The tough one: Rebalance structures/weapons/explosives. The previous structure tier should not be made entirely useless the minute you get to the next tier. Wood is useless once you tame a big dino, stone is useless when you get a rocket launcher, and I can only imagine what will happen to metal once we get tek tier (not to mention the titan.)

In summary, PvP improvement should not lie in arbitrary constructs instituted by the devs, but instead the player should be free to PvP without intervention. However, this system only works if the underlying framework is well balanced. (And it is currently not. At all.)

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17 hours ago, CovertLizard said:

I think adding a lot of structure to PvP is getting away from the spirit of the game. As everyone has pointed out, this bounty system would require arbitration by a judge to determine the value of tames, which is bad. Values are set by players deciding what they want based on how they play, and it should remain that way. To many people, a lystro is a waste of time, but maybe someone else places a high level on them because they have a lystro petting zoo. (idk). Anyway, I think that a better improvement to PvP lies in the following steps:

  1. Reduce the grind. It should not take hours and hours to construct a wooden base. The grind should be exponentially lower for lower tiers.
  2. Increase strength of walls, decrease strength of doors/gates/windows. Make offline defense based more on the way in which the base is set up, funneling attackers into firing zones/traps/mazes etc.
  3. The tough one: Rebalance structures/weapons/explosives. The previous structure tier should not be made entirely useless the minute you get to the next tier. Wood is useless once you tame a big dino, stone is useless when you get a rocket launcher, and I can only imagine what will happen to metal once we get tek tier (not to mention the titan.)

In summary, PvP improvement should not lie in arbitrary constructs instituted by the devs, but instead the player should be free to PvP without intervention. However, this system only works if the underlying framework is well balanced. (And it is currently not. At all.)

True, the value of something is subjective, but 10 metal ingots (or a lvl 1 Lystro egg or whatever) is still better than only an ugly red log.

The grind is generally too much, but we can't forget the affection/accomplishment factor that devs wanted, strongly rooted in the game. Reducing the grind too much makes the game a bit bland. At lower tiers you enjoy the game the most IMHO.
The problem here is that small tribes will be helpless as usual on high tiers.

The funneling idea is great, but we first need bigger and easier walls to place, like behemoth walls.

The tought one... heh... you mean remaking the game? xD I'm 100% in, but I think is just utopia.

As you stated there aren't easy solutions. I found the bounty system the better suited one because has less side effects; it doesen't impact the core idea of the game. Obviously it's hard to develop and maintain.
Finally, I really hope that some of these rebalances will come in game, but even so "griefers" will still have fun with you.:Jerbcry:

Thanks for all the constructive posts!

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  • 2 weeks later...
On ‎11‎/‎28‎/‎2016 at 9:31 AM, Ep1cM0nk3y said:

There should at least be a karma system where ppl know that you kill players a lot and vice versa. I would want to keep the game (pvp) as open as possible tho, more options means greater replay value and more fun. 

A karma or moral system would be ideal. Although, I guess it would ruin anyone who has less than honest intentions chances at pulling on over on you.

3 hours ago, PLUMPA said:

I am so disgusted with PVP! Nothing left on server except empty broken bases Alfa tribes and trolls.

 

It pays to scout out a server before starting a base. The fact that there were "empty broken bases" should be a red flag. Either there was an alpha tribe war, or more likely, lots of trolling. Usually if you run into folks on a server and chat with them (not server chat), they'll fill you in on how that server is governed.

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