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PVE Declaration of War Banditry


Poppet

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19 hours ago, SaltyMonkey said:

I’m actually surprised so many people use alliances to trade. People go on about how bad insiding is, then ally up with complete strangers.

This is a very interesting point for a couple of reasons;

The first is that insiding should not be complained about on pve, due to the tribe ranking system. If this is used appropriately, it will protect your stuff from inviting people that you may not neccesarily trust into the tribe. Although insiding can occur between two trusted parties due to a falling out, I presume that's not what you were referring to here. The second point is that with this exploit now being more commonly taken advantage of, I find it puzzling that someone you may not know who is invited into an alliance, can take away everything you own with less chance of defending yourself than if you invited them into your actual tribe.

@invincibleqc In the same way that alliances weren't designed to be used as a trading tool, it also wasn't designed for this issue at hand. The key difference is that creating an alliance for trading is not breaking any code of conduct and does not harm anyone if both parties are genuine in their desire to trade. I feel griefers and trolls having access to this exploit is unacceptable and while "alliances should have your back in a war" is a good counter argument, it's not enough to satisfy this issue. I feel to resolve this issue they could either add governance options to an alliance similar to that of the tribe options, or create a new system itself... Perhaps a standalone trading alliance as poppet suggested above?

Pardon the pun, but Ark is always evolving, in the past the only reason this exploit was used was to kill your stuff and take your items and resources. However when Wild Card introduced cryo to combat the tame cap, they also gave this exploit another reason to be used. And in the same way that Ark evolved to deal with the tame cap, I believe it must now evolve again to deal with this.

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@Jacira I don’t think alliances should change. Trading is a product of the community and people adopted the alliance mechanic to help with said said trades even though it isn’t designed for that. I don’t think the community gets to decide how the game works but should suggest new mechanics that should be considered to combat a system that doesn’t work the way they appropriated it to.

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3 hours ago, Jacira said:

The first is that insiding should not be complained about on pve, due to the tribe ranking system. If this is used appropriately, it will protect your stuff from inviting people that you may not neccesarily trust into the tribe. Although insiding can occur between two trusted parties due to a falling out, I presume that's not what you were referring to here. The second point is that with this exploit now being more commonly taken advantage of, I find it puzzling that someone you may not know who is invited into an alliance, can take away everything you own with less chance of defending yourself than if you invited them into your actual tribe.

Actually, the tribe ranking won't protect you much if you invite a random that is determined to steal stuff as he can still pull out c4 the second you are not around, blow all your cryofridges and loot all your frozen dinos regardless of the restrictions the rank he was placed into has. Inviting a random to your tribe pretty much have the same security risks as inviting a random tribe into your alliances. Both allows anyone with bad intentions to get what they want hence why you must be careful when inviting randoms.

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The thing is there is an out cry currently in the community regarding this exploit, and if no one posted regarding it no one would know what is going on. 

But the fact that there has been few topics now regarding this might be worth looking into it and make some changes to system at the end of the day the game is made out by its players. 

 

 

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2 hours ago, Plum28 said:

The thing is there is an out cry currently in the community regarding this exploit, and if no one posted regarding it no one would know what is going on. 

But the fact that there has been few topics now regarding this might be worth looking into it and make some changes to system at the end of the day the game is made out by its players. 

 

 

But it’s not an exploit. It’s people using a mechanic for which it’s not intended for (i.e. trading) and only now coming to terms of the consequences of using that system. People becoming victims of alliance tribe wars is not new and has cropped up in the past in these very forums a couple years ago. Granted not everyone uses the forums but for those that do, clearly payed no attention to it because at the time, it didn’t affect them.

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I like the idea of either adding tiers to alliances for specific purposes or just adding in a new alliance feature for trading. Honestly adding onto the current alliance system would probably be better as you could specify full alliance, boss running alliance, trade alliance, etc. Not sure how good of a feature this would be for PvP but for PvE it would be a godsend.

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48 minutes ago, SaltyMonkey said:

But it’s not an exploit. It’s people using a mechanic for which it’s not intended for and only now coming to terms of the consequences of using that system. People becoming victims of alliance tribe wars is not new and has cropped up in the past in these very forums a couple years ago. Granted not everyone uses the forums but for those that do, clearly payed no attention to it because at the time, it didn’t affect them.

exploit verb [ T ] (USE UNFAIRLY)

To use someone or something unfairly for your own advantage:

to exploit or use nefariously aspects or the game for personal gain, Abuse or misuse aspects or a mechanic use to enhance the unfriendliness of the game

 

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51 minutes ago, Plum28 said:

exploit verb [ T ] (USE UNFAIRLY)

To use someone or something unfairly for your own advantage:

to exploit or use nefariously aspects or the game for personal gain, Abuse or misuse aspects or a mechanic use to enhance the unfriendliness of the game

 

People using the alliance system for trades is its unintended purpose, tribe declaring war and their alliance to follow suit is intended, hence not an exploit.

*I’ve edited my original post for clarity.

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1 minute ago, SaltyMonkey said:

People using alliances for trades is not intended.

People using the alliance solely to gain access to destroying another person's base and take all their stuff when they would otherwise be unable to is almost the definition of exploiting. I'm not sure how you can facepalm someone who is literally quoting the dictionary...

This act of griefing is not lessened by the fact that people are using alliances for trading, despite that not being an alliance's intended purpose either. The trading part is just the phishing phase (as invincibleqc said). However they could phish for an alliance through other means too... (boss fights etc...).

I'm also not saying alliances should change, rather they should be improved upon. I can see the argument from both sides and I have stated such in my previous posts, however you seem solely fixated on blaming traders entirely when this issue presents a real opportunity to make Ark a better game. I'm not sure why you're trying to stifle that?

5 hours ago, invincibleqc said:

Actually, the tribe ranking won't protect you much if you invite a random that is determined to steal stuff as he can still pull out c4 the second you are not around, blow all your cryofridges and loot all your frozen dinos regardless of the restrictions the rank he was placed into has. Inviting a random to your tribe pretty much have the same security risks as inviting a random tribe into your alliances. Both allows anyone with bad intentions to get what they want hence why you must be careful when inviting randoms.

Once again you have outdone me, great points and thanks again for your contribution.

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21 minutes ago, Jacira said:

People using the alliance solely to gain access to destroying another person's base and take all their stuff when they would otherwise be unable to is almost the definition of exploiting. I'm not sure how you can facepalm someone who is literally quoting the dictionary...

This act of griefing is not lessened by the fact that people are using alliances for trading, despite that not being an alliance's intended purpose either. The trading part is just the phishing phase (as invincibleqc said). However they could phish for an alliance through other means too... (boss fights etc...).

I'm also not saying alliances should change, rather they should be improved upon. I can see the argument from both sides and I have stated such in my previous posts, however you seem solely fixated on blaming traders entirely when this issue presents a real opportunity to make Ark a better game. I'm not sure why you're trying to stifle that?

Once again you have outdone me, great points and thanks again for your contribution.

Alliances enable member tribes to build within range of one another, share feeding troughs, share electricity/power generation, share tribe chat, and buffs when fighting. Specifically for PvE, it also means that all allied tribes are included in a tribe war when one has been initiated by a member tribe.

These are the intended mechanics of alliances. By adopting the alliance system for trading, this is not an intended mechanic so falling victim to tribe wars could have been avoided had you known the intended purposes of the alliance system, hence not an exploit and something that could have easily been avoided.

I may also add, in the case for PvP, allied tribes bypass the defences of member tribes making raiding easier for turncoats. Alliances may make life easier but it is the choice of a tribe to join an alliance, it is not necessary, and is certainly not forced upon them. People using the system for its intended purposes no matter the intent is not the issue here, it’s complacency and taking things for granted which has led people to this mess.

 

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41 minutes ago, SaltyMonkey said:

Alliances enable member tribes to build within range of one another, share feeding troughs, share electricity/power generation, share tribe chat, and buffs when fighting. Specifically for PvE, it also means that all allied tribes are included in a tribe war when one has been initiated by a member tribe.

They can't share tribe chat, but I get what you mean, ally chat.

42 minutes ago, SaltyMonkey said:

These are the intended mechanics of alliances.

Yes, but in it's purest form of intent, when going into a tribe war. You are pulled in to support the ally tribe that has declared the war on your behalf. It is not intended for that would-be ally to turn on you with the other enemy and destroy everything you own. 

44 minutes ago, SaltyMonkey said:

By adopting the alliance system for trading, this is not an intended mechanic so falling victim to tribe wars could have been avoided had you known the intended purposes of the alliance system, hence not an exploit and something that could have easily been avoided.

You completely missed my point and failed to rebut, specifically; 

1 hour ago, Jacira said:

The trading part is just the phishing phase (as invincibleqc said). However they could phish for an alliance through other means too... (boss fights etc...).

Boss fights, of which, IS something that you yourself mentioned as an intended use of the alliance system.

45 minutes ago, SaltyMonkey said:

People using the system for its intended purposes no matter the intent is not the issue here, it’s complacency and taking things for granted which has led people to this mess.

I disagree, first of all because using the system for it's intended purposes is part of the issue here, as mentioned above if someone were invited into an alliance for a boss fight and what eventuated was the other party effectively ganking them. You can hardly blame the victim for trying to use the alliance system "as intended" when the exploiters instead turn on them and take everything they have. I believe it's erroneous to call someone complacent because they didn't suspect someone wanting to ally with them (for intended purposes or not) would lead to having everything they owned destroyed and stolen out from under them.

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1 hour ago, SaltyMonkey said:

@Jacira I’m not disputing what people do within the alliance system is scummy, just that people need to be aware that trading is not the intended purpose of alliances, so at this point I think it’s best we agree to disagree.

agreeing to disagreeing is not the solution, because we actually are in agreement that trading is not the intended purpose of an alliance. That much is black and white. However when it comes to the exploit being discussed, that is completely irrelevant due to the points I have previously outlined.

@Joebl0w13 Thank you for admitting that you're refusing to acknowledge or confront this problem.

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1 hour ago, SaltyMonkey said:

What if the ally alliance leader is the corrupt one?

well, first off - why would u join someone who's untrustworthy?  Secondly, the way it is now, you have to worry about everyone in the alliance.  THis way, the leader's reputation on the server will dictate how successful they are, won't it?  

 

Even then there's always risk, players have family , girlfriends. . girlfriends who go and give all your dinos away because they are mad at you..  you cant eliminate it altogether, but you can minimize it and having one extra rule can't hurt at this point w/ alliances.

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16 minutes ago, GrumpyBear said:

well, first off - why would u join someone who's untrustworthy?  Secondly, the way it is now, you have to worry about everyone in the alliance.  THis way, the leader's reputation on the server will dictate how successful they are, won't it?  

 

Even then there's always risk, players have family , girlfriends. . girlfriends who go and give all your dinos away because they are mad at you..  you cant eliminate it altogether, but you can minimize it and having one extra rule can't hurt at this point w/ alliances.

What if the bolded text is from the alliance leader?

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5 minutes ago, SaltyMonkey said:

What if the bolded text is from the alliance leader?

Think he already explained that. You can't stop every instance but one extra change can minimize it a bit.

Right now, since a single alliance can consist of five tribes, you have at minimum 5 chances of a war starting instead of with his change, 1. 

 

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4 hours ago, GrumpyBear said:

This problem has the easiest solution - only ally alliance leaders to declare war.

Merging this line of thinking I believe the easiest way to eliminate this problem is to implement governance options for alliances. This could include things like; alliance-wide war declarations, shared building zones, chat privileges etc allowing users the opportunity to define what sort of alliance they want. This would also add to immersion as well, because in real life there are many different types of alliances; war alliances, trading alliances, business alliances. It's not to say that just because two entities are allies in a single aspect that one MUST back the other up should they go to war.

If this change was implemented a person joining an alliance wouldn't be so frightened if they could check the 'type' of alliance they are entering into.

As with all these suggestions there is still a modicum of risk, but I actually consider that a positive rather than a negative. Ark should never be too comfortable of a place to live, but where alliances are concerned, it should at least have an option to protect yourself. Yes you can argue that we can protect ourselves now by not entering into an alliance period, but why put self-impose limits on using core gameplay features when they can instead be adapted on to become safer in their intended use?

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4 hours ago, yekrucifixion187 said:

Think he already explained that. You can't stop every instance but one extra change can minimize it a bit.

Right now, since a single alliance can consist of five tribes, you have at minimum 5 chances of a war starting instead of with his change, 1. 

 

5 tribes? You spelt 12 wrong.

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On 8/11/2019 at 4:43 AM, Jacira said:

It is also worth noting that this exploit was completely unknown to the PVE trading community until a month ago. 

This mechanic has been used for ages. A friend list his base back on legacy due to it. 

It's been a known risk since the games inception as far as I'm aware. 

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