Player Features and Ideas Discussion

TL;DR

---

What?

A proposed change to the bounty and killrights systems. The introduction of Bounty Hunters.

Why?

These topics have been discussed for years, it is generally agreed that both systems are "broken," with the Bounty system being the one that appears to be in most need of improvement.

How?

I believe that bounties and killrights which are currently seperate mechanics, can be combined to create a viable solution to the problems associated with both.

Theres the short version, if you are interested in the nitty gritty then you'll have to sit down and take the time to read through my proposal in full.

---

What?

A proposed change to the bounty and killrights system, that will both give purpose to bounties (other than a "badge of honor,") and allow those who were unjustly wronged to exact revenge on there foes. Creating a new and vibrant profession in New Eden, the Bounty Hunter.

Why?

I believe that most players would agree that as it stands the bounty system is useless. With the exception of players wearing the "Wanted" banner as badge of honor, bounties currently provide no meaningful content, and is a system that has been neglected entirely since its creation.

Killrights on the other hand are less broken, in that technically they work, however the people who gain these killrights tend to be incapable of using them for there intended purpose. Indeed in most situations the players who are killed are generally non-combat pilots, industrialists, the "carebear" cross-section of the Eve Universe.

With the upcoming Inferno expansion, a promised "war expansion," which appears to mean an expansion geared solely towards improving current combat and war mechanics. I feel that while this will likely not make it into any initial part of this expansion it should be looked at in detail and considered as an "iteration" of said expansion.

How? AKA the Details!


Bounties, or Wanted - Kill on Sight:

Bounties currently can only be applied to characters below -1.0 security status, and as such are generally seen on player pirates, gankers, and other PVPers. Having a Wanted tag splashed across ones portrait, as a result of someone elses anger is a proud achievement for a new player entering into the dark underworlds of Eve. However most players would agree that placing a bounty that is actually worthwile on another player is in general not worth it as that player may turn around and collect it themselves. Also that it is quite difficult for one to collect that bounty as it requires a pod kill.

This subject has been discussed at length, and the proposal to have bounties subtracted from a sum-total based upon the loss inflicted on the character, whether ship or pod, definately serves to help this system being gamed, and make it more meaninful. For those of you who have been living under a rock and do not know what I'm referring to, I will give you an example and a link.

---

Player has a bounty of 10 million ISK.
Player gets killed flying a Rifter, and he gets podded afterwords.
The total ship loss according to the killmail is 6 million ISK.
3 million isk worth of modules are dropped.
Payout for ship kill is 6 million - 3 million (module drop) - some percentage of the remainder
For arguments sake we will say the payout was 2.5 million ISK

Remaining bounty would now be 7.5 million ISK
Player has full +4 implants in, approximately 100 million ISK value.
Pay out for pod kill would clear the remaining bounty paying out the killer another 7.5million ISK for a total of 10 million, no more bounty.

All numbers used here are entirely hypothetical and in no way reflect what was proposed in the changes to bounty payouts thread. Essentially these numbers are used to clarify.

---

This proposal is good, and I think that it would definately assist in making bounties more worthwile. However I see another way to which this can be improved and it is tied to sec status. As mentioned before bounties can only be applied to character below a -1.0 security status. In some ways this is OK. The problem arises with players who are above the -5.0 sec status which allows them to live in high-sec, and cannot be agressed without the agressor being flagged with a Global Criminal Countdown (GCC). These players if they chose to live in high-sec are unlikely to ever have that bounty collected upon.

I propose that any player who gained a bounty while having a low security status, that is any sec below 0.0 be KoS for any player. Preventing one from hiding in NPC corps, and from hiding in high-sec, of course this player could chose to never undock again, but in such a case one might consider that bounty as money well spent. I also propose that only players with less than -5.0 sec status be allowed to recieve a bounty from anyone, at any time without anything to trigger it. Triggers discussed later.

Example:

Player with -5.5 sec status (outlaw) has a bounty placed on there head for say 2 billion ISK.
Around this time they decide to retire from a life of crime and become a carebear, so they proceed to rat there security status back up to a respectable level for arguments sake lets say 1.0
They then move to high-sec and begin a life of missioning and mining, however this character still has the 2 billion bounty on there head. They are flagged as "flashy red" and can be engaged by any player at any time within high-sec without fear of reprocussion from Concord.

Continued...

Bounty Hunters, and player policing:

Player policing is something that has been mentioned in the past by CCP, and I believe that Bounty hunters are the logical first step towards this. Players belonging to player corporations, that are registered with Concord as such, would be considered bounty hunters. These players and these players alone would be able to kill players with bounties generated through killrights, as those players would be flagged to them only. Of course there needs to be a way for the individual with a bounty registered against them to be able to identify these bounty hunters as they pass eachother in the space lanes.

Bounty hunters would not be flagged as agressable by those with bounties until the bounty hunter agresses first, much the same as the way outlaws are restricted in agression on low-security gates, generating a GCC if the outlaw agresses first, in high-sec of course this would provoke an immediate concord response. However bounty hunters would be visible with a Concord emblem on the overview, much like those with bounties have a skull with black background already.

Of course just passing through systems hoping to come across one of these bountied individuals wouldn't be much fun, and would likely result in a lot of boredome. So at bounty offices you could check to see the most recently generated bounty contracts, as well as the most valuable. Having access to locator agents would be important as you could track the location of different marks, so these offices would have locators available to bounty hunter corporations with the required standings to that agents corporation as opposed to the way mission agents work, where the individual player needs to have appropriate standings.

The ability to engage anyone with a bounty would certainly be of benefit to the bounty hunter, presenting targets of opportunity. A bounty hunter would also be able to see the "contracted value" of ISK on that players head through the show info, thus ensuring they do not need to return to a bounty office to check on the value before deciding whether or not to engage.

The collection of these bounties would work exactly the same as suggested earlier in the section detailing bounties.

Hopefully this wasn't too painful to read, and that some/most of you can understand this. Discuss.