Player Features and Ideas Discussion

As all we know the bounty Hunter Profession is irrevocably broken.

In this thread I will propose a new mechanic of how it could be fixed and become viable, hopefully in the next expansion.

But first, lets examine WHY the current iteration is broken.

In real life, bounty hunters exist because they can either a)keep their prey hostage and deliver them to authorities, or b)kill them.Then they collect the bounty. But both this options don't work in EVE because we are immortal gods, able to reincarnate infinite times in an instant. Death in EVE is cheap.If you are prepared, you can actually even make profit by killing yourself, and collecting your own bounty.The only expense was your clone upgrade!

How do we fix it?Well we find something that truly hurts people, and imlpement it as the TARGET of the bounty.But what hurts most losing in EVE?What can make people really afraid of undocking, unless ravenous bounty hunters feed upon them?Pod killed?Nahh as we said its cheap.Implants?Well maybe, but Clone Jump can break that easily.A ship?Well just one ship can be replaced eventually, especially if the pilot has the mantra ' don't fly what you can afford' taken by heart.What people hate losing most?Well ISK ofcourse.Those little fantasy moneys that took days or months earning.That will hurt.

But how you put this in a bounty.You can't tie,gag someone and steal their fantasy moneys.But how about ISK Damage?



I proudly present you new the new Bounty Mechanic:
Now that the new Kill mails can easily calculate how much ISK where lost in a ship loss, there can be new Bounty Contracts that will ask for a certain total ISK Damage.These will be accepted by the bounty hunters, and the ISK Damage will be calculated by the Killmails where the Bounty Hunter appeared.This ISK total amount will be counted only for the bounty hunter that accepted the contract.Lets give an example of how this could work (prices are imaginary):

John wants to place a Bounty on George.He places a 100 million bounty, for a total damage of 1 billion as a Contract in Bounty Market.The bounty money are taken by Johns wallet and deposited in the contract.
Now here comes Justin, an aspiring bounty hunter.He access the Bounty Contract Market and decides to accept the contract.A counter starts, on total damage inflicted to George(the target) by Justin (the bounty hunter) in total ISK.This also gives killing rights to Justin in all types of space to kill his target.Now, with locator agents for example, he finds George and he kills his shiny Tengu (600mill loss in the kill mail) and being an awesome dude he even kills the replacement Tengu just after George undocked from Jita (600mil loss).the ISK Counter is at 1.2 billion, over the required 1 billion amount, so the Bounty is considered complete, and Justin gets the contract money.

So,in conclusion the Bounty hunter actually get to kill and damage his target,and got payed for it. The Issuer is happy because he did real damage to his target, AND the target cries over his 1.2 bill loss. Also the Target cant kill himslef, becasue the money he will get would be less than those he lost.
This system can be expanded to be used VS Corps and VS alliances (POS losses,total Ships Lost) and issued to whole groups of people (Bounty Hunter Corps Anyone?).Or eve specific ships/POS etc (e.x. kill his Carrier, collect 300 mil)
To avoid abuse, the Contracts will have the folowing rules:

1.A target CANT be issued multiple Bounties by the same Source but CAN have Multiple Bounties by different Sources.
2.The Bounty Contract Takes effect after some time (24 hours?) to avoided used by Gangers.
3.The contract cannot be canceled after 30% of the total ISK damage is done to avoid ripping off the hunters.
4.The Contact has a expiry date.The amount is taken by the issuers wallet instantly, and it is given back if the Contract Expires without being fulfilled,despite any damage to the target.
4.After a certain number of Contracts, the Target cannot be contracted again for a time to avoid constant bounty spam.
5.The Bounty Hunter must BE in the Kill Mails to be legal.
6.The TARGET can shoot the Hunter. No one else can intervene unless in low or 0.0 space ofcourse.
EDIT
7.Kill rights are awarded after a certain amount of time has passed to avoid abusing.
8.The REWARD amount must be always LOWER than the DAMAGE amount

Well this is it.Discuss!

tl:dr
The new bounty system will target total isk damage done to the target by the hunter that accepted the contract.This way it hurts more than getting podded.

Someone read my Wall Of TEXT?That a win right there!

Yeah, but the basic principle of a bounty was that you threatened something the hunted figure wanted to protect.
In real life, that equates to freedom or their life.

ISK is the closest in game equivalent we can threaten with any sense of loss to the target.

Why don't give kill rights?The kill right will be given only to the guys that accepted the contract, possibly with a timer in to avoid intsa gangs.Everyone else will get concorded.

Hmm....this can work as a fail safe for High Sec (You have to be a bad guy to give kill rights to people so you get bountys on your head) I think it will put unnecessary restrictions to the occupation.Also this cant work in Nullsec. What I would like is A BIG alliance leader issuing Bounties versus other Alliance leaders, like using assasins.But not to get him poded, but maybe hunt for their Titans (70bil damage loss anyone?) . And any space ninja can hunt for it .While in low sec they can use to either hunt for pirates, or hunt the pirate hunter themselves.

The great minds collide..
I will read and discuss.

The innovation of the system is not, despite appearances, the ISK damage only .Its the contract mechanic.You can use it to put either ISK damage or certain items (i.e the aforomentioned Titan) as targets.

With a quick read, our concepts are almost the same.However,I haven't seen anywhere WHO can shoot.Anyone?The that isn't not a profession, but a shoot-the-turkey game.And if he is a 0.0 PVPer, the bounty will go to the people that always kill him if he gets to fleet fights.Thats why i propose a contract basis.Only people that accepted the contract can shoot him.
Also why not blues?The point of getting a bounty is be scared and feel hunted.Even by greedy friends .Let the diplos short it out afterwards.

More discussion when I thoughly read your post

But not something enforced by game mechanics...