Call attention to dangerous pirates

I'll give your idea credit. It's fun, doesn't change any real game mechanics, and gives people who have worked toward something a certain "reward". It's for sure interesting and immaginitive.

I have a few problems, however. One is, what constitutes a "win/loss" ratio? # sinks/# times sunk? Is this only for player ships or do ghost/skelly ships count as well? I think you'll find that because of the numerous activities pirates can take on the seas, this number will probably poorly reflect any actual "danger" a certain player presents. This is not a combat game. It's an adventure game with pvp elements. That makes any statistics very difficult to measure how "good" or "dangerous" or "skilled" a player is. Ship size, under-crewed ships, regular crew vs open crew, etc are just a few of the variables that would be so mind-boggling to calculate into anything meaningful that the end result will be not worth the time/effort/coding to implement.

Secondly, I feel like, unless this is optional or could be toggled, it might take away player agency. Say I'm a very skilled pirate with many sinks under my belt. I might be considered "deadly" according to whatever metrics the game uses. But what if I just want to sail around and make friends? If I could not toggle this setting off, then many and most players will not trust or want to interact with me because of my "deadly" status. If you can toggle it off, then it becomes more of a "cosmetic", which I have no problem with, but also becomes useless in "altert[ing] lower skilled players".

Another thing to consider is that maybe I'm a super great deadly player, however I'm playing open crew with people who are new, or maybe I'm hopping on for a nice fishing session with my daughter or something. People on the lookout for good fights might track me down and attempt to engage when I'm really just not looking for that. I know that might happen anyway, but in those situations I do what I can to not paint a target on my back, and this paints a target on my back.

I think it's a fun, creative, cool idea. I just don't particularly enjoy what it would do to the game. I feel like with Streamers normally showing combat against other players, it has given certain communities the idea that that is what this game is! PVP fighting other pirates. And that is certainly a part of the game. But there is far more to it than that, and my most fond memories of this game have been times when I've had fun with my crew, formed great alliances, and just tried to enjoy my time without worrying about my K/D ratio.

@foxdodge said in Call attention to dangerous pirates:

@wolfmanbush It should be fine. When you play an online game it's normally expected that you'll see someone else's gamertag, as well as having your own on display.

How would it bring additional risk and targeting?

People might check out the wanted posters to see if, for example, a streamer is on the same server, and if not switch server until they find one.

Or, instead of a streamer, a pirate they have encountered in the past and know how to trigger.

@prescafatty no

@lem0n-curry just make streamer only servers.

@treefittymonsta said in Call attention to dangerous pirates:

@lem0n-curry just make streamer only servers.

I'd rather they just limit server and portal hopping - fixes both issues I mentioned... and then some.

@lem0n-curry said in Call attention to dangerous pirates:

@treefittymonsta said in Call attention to dangerous pirates:

@lem0n-curry just make streamer only servers.

I'd rather they just limit server and portal hopping - fixes both issues I mentioned... and then some.

I didn't see u mention any of this on this thread?

@treefittymonsta said in Call attention to dangerous pirates:

@lem0n-curry said in Call attention to dangerous pirates:

@treefittymonsta said in Call attention to dangerous pirates:

@lem0n-curry just make streamer only servers.

I'd rather they just limit server and portal hopping - fixes both issues I mentioned... and then some.

I didn't see u mention any of this on this thread?

??
You came with a (IMHO bad) solution so streamers wouldn't be targeted by people who'd use wanted posters to target streamers.
I gave an alternative to that, that will also diminish people targeting non-streamers.

If your reaction is to "and then some", I didn't want to derail the topic :).

@maximusarael020 Those are all really good points.

Maybe "infamy" builds up with your actions, and cools automatically over time. So if you and your crew were on a tear, destroying everyone and everything in sight, even across multiple servers, you'd gain infamy. But if you're not sinking ships (regardless of whether you're playing or logged off taking a break) your infamy "cools." When you come back a few days later to play with your daughter, or make friends on the seas, you'd have no more infamy.

This would very much fit the "per session" SoT style of play.

Reaper Flags exist.

@prescafatty

Oh I like something like that. A per-session thing showing if you've been doing a good amount of PVP and winning. It would be interesting to implement with all the differently variables, "who shot first", etc, but if it's session-by-session that limits it's ability to cause any long-term issues. There might be times when you are doing a FOTD and keep sinking the same solo sloop that comes back to fight 5 times that would raise your "infamy", but I'm guessing that isn't something that would happen enough that it would detract from people's play styles with this mechanic. Very cool and interesting.

@foxdodge No, no, Wolfie is right (can I call you Wolfie?). People, especially in games like this, will take advantage of any ability to grief other players. It doesn't even matter if it would be rare, if it happened to some that's too many. A mechanic like that could be used to track streamers or just "enemies" that someone likes to taunt. Can you imagine encountering someone once and they are racist/homophobic or something and then whenever they see you on a server they hunt you down and grief you to no end? Sure you could report them but as long as they are smart about it what could you say? This ship keeps sinking me in a pirate game? Burden of proof would be too high and would cause issues. It's a fun idea for a better version of humanity which we don't currently have.

@prescafatty said in Call attention to dangerous pirates:

It'd be cool if particularly deadly crews received in-game signifiers that told the rest of the server how dangerous they were.

Like, if you're a PL with a high win / loss ratio against other crews you get:

A wanted poster at every outpost, letting other players know you are on the server, and what your ship looks like.
A slight darkening of the skies and seas where you travel.
A new musical cue when a spyglass is trained on you.
An in-game statue of your crew.

It would alert lower skilled players and give them a slight edge, and it would let dangerous crews revel in their infamy.

That sounds awesome. I'd love to have a wanted poster of my pirate in every tavern.

@foxdodge There are streamers that already change their gamertag every few weeks to avoid people who hunt them. This would just exasperate the issue further.

This would be a big no from me.

@foxdodge There are bigger problems that need addressing, but they are mostly societal and won't be solved with any amount of coding or game mechanics.

@wolfmanbush said in Call attention to dangerous pirates:

A wanted poster is not subtle or vague, it will be used as justification for hunting down specific players.

Isn't that the point of a wanted poster?

if you're a PL with a high win / loss ratio

What if your not a PL? Some of the most deadly pirates are the ones who aren't PL and just do pirate stuff :p

A wanted poster at every outpost, letting other players know you are on the server, and what your ship looks like.

Hmmm. The outpost would have a full wall of every pirare then.

A slight darkening of the skies and seas where you travel.

So the whole sky will be dark as every pirate would be dangerous.

@metal-ravage said in Call attention to dangerous pirates:
The player bounty system was implemented in GTA online with terrible consequences, grieving and trolling among others.

There is a game called planetside that monetized a bounty system. Players could purchase a bounty against another player with real money. Usually it was used for players that would get a high K/D ratio. Once the target was killed, the killer would get a slight bonus of xp and the bounty was removed. Also, I believe the target would get a bonus xp. Perhaps Rare could implement something similar to make more revenue

@wolfmanbush The way I see it, the consequences are:

Rare makes money, players make more gold.

There wouldn't be posters of players in the taverns, perhaps just the boats. Also, a bountied boat could show vaguely on the map or some defining effect occurs to make boat more visible.

I'm sure in pirate days there were plenty of bounties pirates had on their heads :D

Two ways to avoid potential harassment:

1. Don't show gamer tags in the wanted poster—only show pirate likeness and the ship.

OR

2. With the captaincy update that's rumored to be coming, let player buy "pirate tags" that are different from their gamer tags.