Regarding the bounty system

[Shynras]

I play games since i was born, and i've seen only 1 game that got this right (and wasn't even that popular or AAA game). 

Ofc the stretch goal isn't reached, but if everything goes right we will still have it after release at worst. Here's my suggestion:

 

-There's a bounty element (that can be linked to the market unit) or the ui could be integrated in the market unit. The bounty element let's you place "bounty contracts". Bounty contracts are pvp contracts that pays a certain amount of money/resources/elements if a specific goal is reached. Let's say that the bad guy stole a ship  from you, and you want someone to recover or destroy it, the bounty contract would look something like this:

(note: to stole a ship, the bad guy needs to hack it, and put his tag on hit. if you have public permission to use, and he takes it, it's not really stolen)

 

-Tag: Bad Guy (choose the owner/tag of the player/players)

-Objective: Ship (you can choose various objectives like elements you want to be destroyed, playername if you want a kill, ..., but note that the objective needs to have the Tag of the bad guy)

-ID: XXX (not necessary for players): let's say that a scanner gives you, when you scan, an ID for each elements it founds. In case of a ship you'll need to write the Core Unit element. 

-Goal: Recover/Destroy ( here you set what you want the bounty hunter to do). To complete the destroy goal you need to destroy the element "Objective" with a certain "ID". in this case you'd destroy the Core Unit of the ship with ID XXX. In case of recover you'll need to bring that ship to the parking area that we've been told will be used to sell/buy constructs (since the bounty station is linked or integrated in the market unit)

 

Another example:

-Tag: Bad Guy (you can choose a tag for a group of player or an entire organization)

-Objective: Player

-ID (only for elements)

-Goal: Kill

 

So, bounties are not just "kill contracts" but "pvp contracts", and it was like that even in the far west, remember "dead or alive" not just "dead".

 

That said, there's a big problem. For Bounty Hunters to exists, there's need to be a way for them to track the bad guys and find them (if you find a bad guy only by chance, bounty hunter will never be viable as a role in the game). How:

There's a technology tree, that gives you access to some equipment (related to bounty hunting). One element in particular is a scanner, that instead of scanning  a large amount of things, just scans in search of specific tags, so that it's a little more powerful in doing that and has more range. You can make it expensive, incompatible with a common scanner, high weight and so on to give the bounty hunter a little handicap when against a pirate, since he has the initiative, and to make it challenging/balance things.

Searching for specific tags is not op, a normal scanner can do that in a x meters range, while the bounty hunter scanner has a handicap of not being able to look for other tags but the specified only, and it gains a little range (this has to be balanced ofc). 

Now, what's really cool about that: a scanner is ONLY able to look for TAGS, not players. This means that you may find the bad guy's ship (his base or something else), but not the actual player. This is how a bad guy (or pirate) will protect himself from bounty hunters. He'll place around the universe many elements with his tag(or the tag there's a bounty on) (maybe elements that he stole and he's recycing for that job or dedicated elements for pirates with the role to confund scanners), so that the bounty hunters will have to potentially travel, search and gear themseves for days. This means that a pirate to be a good pirate needs to be active, spend some of his resources to create a system to deceive the bounty hunters (and steal/fight to get the money they need). On the other hand, bounty hunters have to be patient and careful (since they have quite an expensive scanner on their ship. They will usually travel alone, since the bad guy could potentially have hundreds of elements spread across the solar system, and when they finally found him, they'll reorganize with more people if needed, to fight. 

[Haunty]

For me the main thing is how to prevent players from collecting their own bounties from a friend. Maybe if you could limit who can claim the bounty to specific individuals or orgs.

[Ripper]

Agreed,

 

A person with a bounty on them should lose more than the price of the bounty.

 

100,000 quanta bounty should make the guy lose 150,000 quanta worth of assets, when the contract is fulfilled.

[Hades]

Agreed,

 

A person with a bounty on them should lose more than the price of the bounty.

 

100,000 quanta bounty should make the guy lose 150,000 quanta worth of assets, when the contract is fulfilled.

"The guy" being the pirate, or "the guy" being the contractor?

 

The former is just silly, why should the bounty pay for the bounty on his head?  The latter doesn't fix the issue of friends collecting bounties.

 

However, one thing that I believe should happen is an organization should be able to create a "prison" in which the the prisoner has to fulfill a certain contract before being released.  

 

Here's how I think that should work, and perhaps I will make a post on it someday:

 

1.)  Each organization should have a "penalty points" related to each organization.  This system would work the same for each and every organization, it's just a base multiplier that monitors how much damage a certain individual has done against an organization.

 

2.)  The "penalty points" would increment based on unprovoked killings, destroying structures, and similar activity... specifics to be dealt out by NQ

 

3.)  The penalty points would equate to a certain length of time and/or objective inside of a prison camp.  ie.) Perhaps it is a prison camp put on top of a mining vein.  Or perhaps it is a factory for assembling parts.

 

4.) Obviously a rival organization can break a prisoner out of a prison.

 

Why do I think a similar system to this is necessary?

 

It creates a reason to check the "alive" box on a bounty.  It creates consequences (that have to be dealt out by players) for their actions.

 

Why must the multiplier be the same for all organizations?  If an organization could modify how many points a player gets, they could grief a certain individual and force them to do their work.

 

If anyone would be interested in such a system, I would be willing to put more thought into it and create a separate post dealing with prison systems.

 

 

 

 

 

More on topic than the previous point:

 

If a bounty hunter is able to scan for a target, I believe a target should be able to "pick up" on that scan.  And thus, they would receive information on who is hunting them, where they are, and all that jazz.  Create some consequences for an "easy scan" button.

[Shynras]

ofc you have to lose more than what to gain with the bounty, otherwise it's just exploitable

[Lethys]

ofc you have to lose more than what to gain with the bounty, otherwise it's just exploitable

I don't quite know what ripper meant - why should the ttarget lose 150k for a 100k contract? The contract is set up by another player who pays the 100k, the target loses already his life and stuff.

 

It shouldn't be abusable but you could just pay out a fraction of the whole bounty, problem solved too

[Hades]

I don't quite know what ripper meant - why should the ttarget lose 150k for a 100k contract? The contract is set up by another player who pays the 100k, the target loses already his life and stuff.

 

It shouldn't be abusable but you could just pay out a fraction of the whole bounty, problem solved too

 

The target shouldn't have to pay anything whatsoever (other than the life and stuff as you say).

 

Nor do I think someone should pay 150k for a 100k bounty.  Perhaps there can be a tax by whoever owns the bounty terminal or whatever... but an arbitrary penalty is ridiculous in a player controlled game.

 

For example, someone posts a 100k bounty on a terminal that has a 10% tax by the owner.  The contractor has to pay 100k (to the bounty upon completion) and 10k for the posting for the tax.

 

We don't know how job postings and whatnot will work though, so this may be a non-factor.  

[Ripper]

The TARGET of the bounty should lose more than the bounty itself to prohibit the target's friend from collecting the bounty and sharing it with the target.

 

Another problem with "Contract" based bounties (hunt down specific player), is that the bounty hunter and player with the contract on their head may never play at the same time.  Plus the universe would be so large that they may never cross paths.

 

 

If I were to design the solution, I'd do something like this:

 

With every death, you have the option to place a bounty on your "killer".

Bounties acumulate on the "killer".

A "bounty scanner" would be used to scan players and ships to see it they are "Wanted".

If the "killer" is killed by someone, the bounty hunter collects the total acumulated bounty.

If the "killer" is killed, they ALSO have a "Lien" placed against their bank account for 150% (or some percentage to be balanced) of the bounty.

The "Lien" acumulates with the bounties that acumulate.

Before purchases in the market can be made, all "Liens" must be paid off.

 

This allows for Pirates to acquire their own loot and run as long as possible. Possibly never returning to the regular market.

Pirates can develop their own "Black Market" that doesn't require quanta.

Pirates can't game the system by having their friend collect the bounty, because they'll take a hit larger than the bounty itself.

The occasional PvP match between non-pirates won't impact the winners wealth that much.  Everyone will get an occasional bounty on their head.

 

There could possibly be exemptions for "Org. Warfare", Bounty Hunters, and possibly other exemptions.

 

A bounty should be MORE than just kill the guy and he loses what he has on him.  That's no different than what he did to deserve the bounty.  It should "hurt" more to be a PK'er or a Pirate.  Hence the "Lien".

 

This also means players can STILL place a "Contract" (hunt the person down and kill them) on someone outside of the "Bounty System".  But that creates the opportunity for greifing with contracts.

[Anaximander]

Actually, EVE Online has a very rigid Bounty system.

If the mark's bounty is smaller than what thet mark lost upon death,  then the bounty hunter collects full bounty.

If the Bounty is BIGGER than what the target lost, then the bounty hunter gets paid the worth of the target's destroyed assets.

Tht way, if the Bounty pool is 1 Billion, if the target is killed (or their ship is destroyed) with a worth of 1 Billion, the bounty hunter gets full bounty pool. But if they are flying smaller ships, like a 10 million worth of a ship, then they need to die 100 times for the bounty to be expunged.

Notice, something must be destroyed for the bounty to be collected.

The marked target loses assets worthy of the bounty the hunter collects - not to mention, the hunter can loot the marked target's wreck, and sell the salvage for even MORE of a payday.

[Ripper]

See...  Twerks / Eve's bounty system is harsher than mine.

 

That "killer" wouldn't be out from under the bounty with one kill.  They could rack up an immense bounty and never be able to return to regular society.

 

Oops after re-reading his post I was wrong, the entire bounty would be rewarded if he was killed with a smaller ship.

 

It's still pretty harsh tho.

[Anaximander]

See...  Twerks / Eve's bounty system is harsher than mine.

 

That "killer" wouldn't be out from under the bounty with one kill.  They could rack up an immense bounty and never be able to return to regular society.

That's the idea. And it doesn't even take into account Killrights - the ability to engage a confirmed PKer, with the victim selling the right to a Reevenge kill, that once it's bought, people can engage the Killright marked target inside High Security space without the police showing up.

 

It's a helluva funny thing. People stake out high security markets, waiting to find out what target they can go after that has a killright on them - let's say a killright costing 1 million - and wage the benefit from the bounty - let's say 10 million - on a target that's flying a ship costing 9 millino. (the nubmers are non-specific, it's an example).

 

Think of what Rocket Racoon did in Guardians of the Galaxy, by browsing targets on their bounties. Same thing. Only if the target you killed is vengeful, they'll place a killright before you can clean the system, and have about 50 other people who do the same thing , go after YOU as you try to flee after a succesful hit.

 

Bounty Hunter is not the easiest of professions :| It's why I stick to more simplistic stuff, like market projections.

[Hades]

The TARGET of the bounty should lose more than the bounty itself to prohibit the target's friend from collecting the bounty and sharing it with the target.

 

Another problem with "Contract" based bounties (hunt down specific player), is that the bounty hunter and player with the contract on their head may never play at the same time.  Plus the universe would be so large that they may never cross paths.

 

 

If I were to design the solution, I'd do something like this:

 

With every death, you have the option to place a bounty on your "killer".

Bounties acumulate on the "killer".

A "bounty scanner" would be used to scan players and ships to see it they are "Wanted".

If the "killer" is killed by someone, the bounty hunter collects the total acumulated bounty.

If the "killer" is killed, they ALSO have a "Lien" placed against their bank account for %150 (or some percentage to be balanced) of the bounty.

The "Lien" acumulates with the bounties that acumulate.

Before purchases in the market can be made, all "Liens" must be paid off.

 

This allows for Pirates to acquire their own loot and run as long as possible. Possibly never returning to the regular market.

Pirates can develop their own "Black Market" that doesn't require quanta.

Pirates can't game the system by having their friend collect the bounty, because they'll take a hit larger than the bounty itself.

The occasional PvP match between non-pirates won't impact the winners wealth that much.  Everyone will get an occasional bounty on their head.

 

There could possibly be exemptions for "Org. Warfare", Bounty Hunters, and possibly other exemptions.

 

A bounty should be MORE than just kill the guy and he loses what he has on him.  That's no different than what he did to deserve the bounty.  It should "hurt" more to be a PK'er or a Pirate.  Hence the "Lien".

 

This also means players can STILL place a "Contract" (hunt the person down and kill them) on someone outside of the "Bounty System".  But that creates the opportunity for greifing with contracts.

Sorry to say, but I don't think anyone will be getting behind this idea ^^

 

Could be wrong, but I kind of doubt it.  Griefing would be waaaayy too easy then.  Just keep putting a bounty on someone you dislike, and they will continue to lose money at a rate of .5 more than you.

 

Besides, with your system in mind... that means the bounty hunter is paid 250%?  Lol no way.

 

I personally think what Twerk said would probably work, although it's a fairly disappointing method.

 

How I wish things would work, and I know... there are still flaws.

 

• You place a bounty on someone, you are the contractor.  You pay for the bounty.

 

• You are the bounty hunter, you cannot collect on the same person within x amount of bounties.  This is to try and deviate from the "collect from friends bounty".  Similarly, there could be other limitations such as:  Can't be in the same organization... other stuff?

 

• I don't think bounties should stack, you can have multiple bounties out on someone but one kill can only go towards one contract.  This would also alleviate the friend problem... as they can't collect all of them at once.

 

• More importantly... there should be a prison system as stated earlier.  This would allow for organizations to bring the culprit in... alive and deal out punishment as such.  Based on a penalty system that is across the board, it isn't created by the organization.  (in order to avoid abuse of course).  This worked phenomenally well in Face of Mankind.  

 

I know this system has many flaws, but it's the barebones of something I'd like to see.

[Hades]

Other post was a little too cluttered, so I'm just going to start a new one ^^

 

I have to wonder if it would be possible for NQ to scrape together some metrics of who you play with and all that kind of stuff.  If player A is in the vicinity of player B x% of the time, it is probably true that they are friends... and thus cannot take bounties on each other.  Something like that.

[Ripper]

1.  Placing a bounty AFTER DEATH prohibits greifing with multiple bounties.. Unless you sit there and let the guy kill you 50 times.

2.  Who said the bounty hunter got 250%?  I said the bounty hunter got 100% (+ salvage), and the "killer" lost 150% (it doesn't go to the BH.  It goes to the bank)

[Anaximander]

Other post was a little too cluttered, so I'm just going to start a new one ^^

 

I have to wonder if it would be possible for NQ to scrape together some metrics of who you play with and all that kind of stuff.  If player A is in the vicinity of player B x% of the time, it is probably true that they are friends... and thus cannot take bounties on each other.  Something like that.

Read the EVE bounty system I pointed towards. Itm akes certain abuse of Bounties can't happen.

[Hades]

1.  Placing a bounty AFTER DEATH prohibits greifing with multiple bounties.. Unless you sit there and let the guy kill you 50 times.

2.  Who said the bounty hunter got 250%?  I said the bounty hunter got 100% (+ salvage), and the "killer" lost 150% (it doesn't go to the BH.  It goes to the bank)

And I'm saying the target shouldn't lose anything.  That's ridiculous.  

 

They should lose their ship and cargo.  Period.  That's how bounties work in practically every single game I've played.

 

@Twerk

 

I just read the EVE system on their wiki, however, all I saw was that the bounty was based on the worth of assets lost by the target.  That doesn't seem very solid in my opinion.  I didn't really understand the complete works however, so you're given the assets they lost and 20% of that cost in bounty payment?

[Ripper]

And I'm saying the target shouldn't lose anything.  That's ridiculous. 

 

Tell me again how you intend to keep them from claiming the bounty on themselves?

 

Your solution has them lose a life (big deal) and a ship (they risked to kill you in the first place)

[Lethys]

The TARGET of the bounty should lose more than the bounty itself to prohibit the target's friend from collecting the bounty and sharing it with the target.

 

Another problem with "Contract" based bounties (hunt down specific player), is that the bounty hunter and player with the contract on their head may never play at the same time. Plus the universe would be so large that they may never cross paths.

 

 

If I were to design the solution, I'd do something like this:

 

With every death, you have the option to place a bounty on your "killer".

Bounties acumulate on the "killer".

A "bounty scanner" would be used to scan players and ships to see it they are "Wanted".

If the "killer" is killed by someone, the bounty hunter collects the total acumulated bounty.

If the "killer" is killed, they ALSO have a "Lien" placed against their bank account for 150% (or some percentage to be balanced) of the bounty.

The "Lien" acumulates with the bounties that acumulate.

Before purchases in the market can be made, all "Liens" must be paid off.

 

This allows for Pirates to acquire their own loot and run as long as possible. Possibly never returning to the regular market.

Pirates can develop their own "Black Market" that doesn't require quanta.

Pirates can't game the system by having their friend collect the bounty, because they'll take a hit larger than the bounty itself.

The occasional PvP match between non-pirates won't impact the winners wealth that much. Everyone will get an occasional bounty on their head.

 

There could possibly be exemptions for "Org. Warfare", Bounty Hunters, and possibly other exemptions.

 

A bounty should be MORE than just kill the guy and he loses what he has on him. That's no different than what he did to deserve the bounty. It should "hurt" more to be a PK'er or a Pirate. Hence the "Lien".

 

This also means players can STILL place a "Contract" (hunt the person down and kill them) on someone outside of the "Bounty System". But that creates the opportunity for greifing with contracts.

You successfully split up the players, congratulations. Pirates won't come to carebear-lala-world and vice versa.

 

Pirates already have to deal with bounties on their head and running from police, having a harder time on the markets, won't get normal jobs/contracts, won't be trusted with stuff (errands, security jobs, guards,..) .....And rightfully so.

 

It makes absolutely no sense that players put a bounty on the pirates' head and when he is killed the pirate has to pay some magical tax/quanta sink/whatever.

 

I don't see contracts happening soon, perhaps only as private vendettas, but more an eve like approach. Everyone can put bounties on heads and the one who kills that baddie gets a cut in that bounty, depending on what the was destroyed. This prevents abuse and depending how players can be found, maybe those contracts will possibly be used too (if implemented).

[Ripper]

It really doesn't matter.  That's how I would do it.

 

Oh and..

 

Only pansy pirates would be afraid to enter "carebare space".  Wait... Is that a nickname for BOO? 

[Lethys]

And I'm saying the target shouldn't lose anything. That's ridiculous.

 

They should lose their ship and cargo. Period. That's how bounties work in practically every single game I've played.

 

@Twerk

 

I just read the EVE system on their wiki, however, all I saw was that the bounty was based on the worth of assets lost by the target. That doesn't seem very solid in my opinion. I didn't really understand the complete works however, so you're given the assets they lost and 20% of that cost in bounty payment?

If you have 100mil bounty on your head and you lose a 20mil ship you get 4mil bounty (20% of shipvalue).

 

Such a system is much more fair than a magical tax which just prevents people from being a pirate and slowly killing the game

[Ripper]

Yeah.. But if Twerk had the idea you'd be all over it!

[Lethys]

Yeah.. But if Twerk had the idea you'd be all over it!

Twerk had no idea at all, this is just eves system. Which I played for 10 years

[Anaximander]

And I'm saying the target shouldn't lose anything.  That's ridiculous.  

 

They should lose their ship and cargo.  Period.  That's how bounties work in practically every single game I've played.

 

@Twerk

 

I just read the EVE system on their wiki, however, all I saw was that the bounty was based on the worth of assets lost by the target.  That doesn't seem very solid in my opinion.  I didn't really understand the complete works however, so you're given the assets they lost and 20% of that cost in bounty payment?

The wiki is seriously outdated. You get bounty equal to the target you killed and whatever loot is left (of an already possibly expensive ship) you sell in the market.

 

The mark loses what they got when you kill them, you get paid on te amount of assets the target had on them when you killed them (not exceeding bounty price though).

 

If I am on a 250 million ship, and the bounty total pool is 1 billion on my head, you will get 250 mil + the loot that drops. IF you kill me at a 300 million ship, you'll get 300 million out of the 1000 million (1 billion)  of the total bounty. You are paid to GRIEF a person, not to set the work in a proper order.

 

Some bounties MAY be rigged to pay a percentage of the damaged goods, but those are never, if at all , favoured. A person may be o na 100 million ship and have only 100000 bounty on them. That's not even worth the attempt, as those people usually are bait for a group they are with to come and murder you the moment you attack them. It's a very cat and mouse game, Bounty Hunting is not an easy profesison. The moment you go after a juicy target, you'll be surroudned by their buddies, and feel like an idiot for following someone down a dark alley.

 

If people feel extra vengeful in EVE, they can even stack the bounty per kill on you to oblivion. So, I may put a 10 million bounty on you, with a 10% pay on the ship you got killed in, but others may add onto that if you are a notorious pirate, so if 100 people put the same bounty as me, on a 10% of the ship's worth, shit may be blown out of proportions, and you could be targeted day and night.

 

Which is how Markeedragon - a famous youtuber on EVE and streamer - has the top bounty in the game. He's also a person JC Baillie (the CEO of NoverQuark) gave an interview during the Kickstarter on the game and what kind of things EVE players could feel familiar about it (as Markeedragon asked questions pertaining to EVE-centric things, like realistic economy and metagaming / sandbox). But Markeedragon knows how to fly safe and is almost never cornered.

 

 

 

Thing is, DU can go one step beyond, with people putting Kill Contracts on Constructs, i.e. hiring a group of players to demolish a building.

[Anaximander]

Twerk had no idea at all, this is just eves system. Which I played for 10 years

And Lethys senpai knows a thing or two about Bounty Hunters!

 

 

He has at least 100000 corpses of bounty hunters, so he must know a lot about them!

[Lethys]

And Lethys senpai knows a thing or two about Bounty Hunters!

 

 

He has at least 100000 corpses of bounty hunters, so he must know a lot about them!

Sadly, they never dared to enter w-space

but I have some goons if that's worth anything hahaha