Iksar said:Zorkon said:It seems to me "Kill Stealing" aka KSing is not what is even being descussed here. Attacking a mob that is not engaged is not stealing a kill.. camp stealing I suppose you can call it assuming camps are defined and recognized by VR.
Kill Stealing as I remember it was after a mob had been engaged somebody would interfere and do over 50% of the damage therefore Stealing the Kill from the person that made the initial engagement.
What is being discussed in this thread is Camp Stealing and in EQ "Camps" were not recognized by management.
I don't think they should be recognized here by VR eather... first hit and it's yours... if you can't Steal the kill by out damaging the other then there will be no such thing as Kill Stealing.
And if you load up an instant cast spell or ability then strength of the player (of the "bully") would also be irrelevant, if little guy hits first and the bully hits big... let him kill it for you then loot it... say thanks and wait for the next spawn. If you both have an instant cast then it's at least a fair competition.
People seem to be using the dreaded "Kill Stealing" name to justify them wanting certain mobs reserved for just for them.... in an open world! Aren't all you who want that basically asking for an instanced world like WOW?
This game is centered on most damage done, there is no first to engage. That stronger/better geared/higher level player or group can come up and burn a mob you are already fighting (whether at a camp or not) and take credit, this is not considered kill stealing as that doesn't exist.
Kilsin: Is this the official and likely final stance of Visionary Realms? Be better than others or hit the road?
I hadn't heard yet that they were going for most damage done instead of first to engage. I watch all the streams, and interviews, and now I just went back through the Game Mechanics section of the FAQ and i can't see where that has been set. Can you help me out and point me in the right direction where this was announced so i can see their reasoning?
Zorkon said:I hadn't heard yet that they were going for most damage done instead of first to engage. I watch all the streams, and interviews, and now I just went back through the Game Mechanics section of the FAQ and i can't see where that has been set. Can you help me out and point me in the right direction where this was announced so i can see their reasoning?
It's in the FAQ under Game Rules 10.0:
"First, if you go around kill stealing and bothering other players your reputation is likely to suffer and you could even be blacklisted such that people refuse to group with you. In terms of the actual mechanic, the player or group that does the most damage will receive the experience and loot (note: this is not yet set in stone and will be evaluated during alpha and beta testing)."
While not "set in stone" (like anything in this game apparently), they have mentioned it a few times in posts when some players ask for FTE.
Iksar said:Kilsin: Is this the official and likely final stance of Visionary Realms? Be better than others or hit the road?
Telling us to go beyond personal feelings (need I mention that "fun" and "accomplishment" are personal feelings) and accept the brutal logic ("survival of the fittest", perhaps?) does sound awfully like that doesn't it. I hope that I'm either misreading Porygon's "spot on" message, or Kilsin is giving his own opinion and not the official stance.
Porygon said:Someone coming into your "camp" and killing your mobs is not griefing or malicious. You might not like it, but it's not against any rule.
...
It's a stretch to say someone killing a pixelated monster, that you also want to kill, is bullying. Theres no laws against someone killing a mob you want to kill. You can compete or leave.
There are "laws" against harassing people. Including the gentleman "stealing" something that belongs to you (your drink) and physically assaulting someone (pushing them off of a bar stool). Those are both crimes. You also have more than the 2 options... ...you can call the police... this is just a really bad analogy.
Someone KSing you, as much as you hate it, is not a crime.
Let me get this out of the way: kill stealing not being against the rules is a non-issue. We are asking for it to be made against the rules. At that point, you will have more than 2 options, such as calling the gms. GMs are literally the game police. They even help you get home if your hearthstone breaks down, or remove undesirable no.1 from the in game society.
The bar stool analogy is a fantastic analogy. To put it simply: "You're in our world now".
Zorkon said:People seem to be using the dreaded "Kill Stealing" name to justify them wanting certain mobs reserved for just for them.... in an open world! Aren't all you who want that basically asking for an instanced world like WOW?
This isn't politics, guys, the people against.., whatever it is that you call what we call KSing, aren't angrily introducing horribly prejudiced jim crow laws here.
We dread it for our own reasons even if you have never had that issue, and we make up, I daresay, a sizable portion of the community. We also are fully aware that there are other options than WoW instancing, such as a strict anti KSing policy, or low population servers with so much content that multiple players wanting a camp enough to harshly compete for it is a non-issue.
Is it so unreasonable to want to be able to claim the reward for your hard work on a camp without worrying about some random passerby claiming it instead? Is it unreasonable for say, a low level soloer in a small guild, to not have much faith in the community's desire to police for them over the high level raider in a big guild?
Kratuk said:To offer Kilsin a little support here, SNIP
I fully agree VR should ignore "he said, she said", but remember that videos are pretty easy to make and pretty hard to dispute. I'll even go so far as to say that if your rig can handle Pantheon when it comes out, it can handle having a clip to attach to a petition.
Also, combat logs with all the numbers can be easily stored. A camp can be proven especially if they assign temporary id numbers to their monsters, without even needing a video at this point.
And if VR can't afford to enforce the rules, the community may be able to help or might not, but it is ultimately a problem VR must fix or eat the loss in fanbase. I trust them enough that I doubt they will pick the loss in fanbase without a strong reason related to positive lore/gameplay.
To be frank, I can't think of a good gameplay reason to allow camp stealing except in the cases of people who camp something for a ridiculously long time (But honestly, just make that against the rules too), or the game costing too much to enforce the anti-ksing rule and still attract customers.
Porygon said:disposalist said:Lol yeah, if someone walks into a bar and takes my pint and shoves me off the barstool, that's fine because I can just go to a bar down the street.
If you're bullied you can walk away, so it's ok? That's the *whole problem*. Someone is *forcing* you away because you happen to be weaker.
And if at your next stop you get bullied again, it's ok as long as it's not the same bully?
And if the original bully bullies different people all day that's ok?
Spread the bullying around around and it's not wrong!
From a "logical perspective" that sounds like a perfect recipe for a terminal toxic build up. It'll be a lovely world when bullies learn they can get away with bad behaviour all day as long as they apply it indiscriminately.
It's a stretch to say someone killing a pixelated monster, that you also want to kill, is bullying. Theres no laws against someone killing a mob you want to kill. You can compete or leave.
There are "laws" against harassing people. Including the gentleman "stealing" something that belongs to you (your drink) and physically assaulting someone (pushing them off of a bar stool). Those are both crimes. You also have more than the 2 options... ...you can call the police... this is just a really bad analogy.
Someone KSing you, as much as you hate it, is not a crime.
Of course it's bullying. It's using your superior power to take something from someone else.
"Stealing" that drink is very much like "stealing" that content I paid to experience just like everyone else. Also, if it took me an hour to get to that monster spawn area and I earn £50 per hour normally, being pushed off that content and having to travel to and break into another equally interesting camp has a 'cost'. My time is precious.
Pushing someone off a barstool is the equivalent. If I were camping a spawn and wandered off to collect resources to come back to find someone camping it that would be like someone taking a stool I'd vacated to visit the toilet. Not as bad. Just turning up and killing the monsters I'm clearly busy killing is much more like shoving me out of my place at the bar.
It's not a perfect example, but it's very much how it feels to me. Your point that the bar incident is a 'crime' that you can call the 'police' to get justice for is exactly right. And there is no such resource in Pantheon apparently.
The point here is exactly what you highlight: Some people clearly think that KSing is simply neither rude nor bullying and definitely not a 'crime'. Others do. Some players clearly enjoy contention and potential conflict. Others want pure PvE enjoyment without some pseudo PvP to get to it. While there is that fundamental disharmony there will never be agreement. The two ways of playing and the underlying attitudes are very different. It's up to VR to make both happy. Tough, yeah, but not impossible at all. Many potential solutions have been explained in this thread and others. None of them involve doing nothing, crossing your fingers and hoping for the best.
The weird thing is, VR apprently *does* consider it a crime, because they state that if it is done in a pattern it is actionable. No one wants to call the police for being shoved off a bar stool. In real life the landlord would tell the bully to give the seat and drink back. If that bully did it again, he would eject that bully because it would get the bar a bad name if he allowed it. No police needed (unless the bully refused to comply with bar rules). No damage to the bar reputation. Only the bully will be put out and he can go down to the local dive bar where they don't care about that behaviour.
What VR are apparently saying is, as I said, not wanting to deal with bullies *at all* as long as they spread the bullying out. The bar could be 50% bullies picking on the other 50% and as long as it's indiscriminate, it's fine! Yeah. That bar would be mostly empty within the week or would be constant bar fights. Personally I stay out of dive bars where there could be a fight at any moment and the place is awful because why fix the furniture and the juke box when it will all get smashed regularly.
When a stranger approaches you in real life, there are laws in place that mean the chances of them robbing, assaulting or abusing you are minimal, even if they are that type of person. The preventative power is huge. People can afford to be friendly and helpful. You can get on with your life without constant fear and suspicion.
If there are no such laws or even guidelines in Pantheon every approaching character is going to be a source of potential irritation and threat. Every encounter with a stranger will be laced with tension and fear. What a basis on which to build a PvE community.
I guess I'll just have to hope that VR *are* employing their decades of experience and I'm completely wrong about it even though *my* decades of gaming tell me otherwise.
I'll give up on this subject now. VR haven't really made their position totally clear to my satisfaction, but maybe they have something up their sleeves. This to-and-fro between contention fans and everyone else is pointless.
Social and competitive design should be molded together and not seen as opposite and opposing facets of game design. In my experience, competition and conflict have always served as a driving force that compelled players to form bonds with others. This is especially true in a group-centric game where players depend on each other to overcome the many obstacles that are inherent in a persistent world. A fantasy world is not a grocery store, parking lot, or concession stand. I would strongly recommend that folks read up on the Bartles study that analyzes player behavior and motivators. We aren't segregating the population and giving the killers/socializers/explorers/achievers their own instances anymore. Terminus will be a melting pot world filled with different personalities and it's up to each and every one of us to network with others and make the most of the opportunities available.
All that said, it's simply good game design to create content that resonates with each player demographic. If there are resources that are worth competing for, you should probably seek out some of the folks who thrive in a competitive environment because competition for resources in an open-world is inherent. That doesn't mean that every single piece of content in the game is going to be competed for. Meaningful risk vs reward should naturally fan people out and alleviate forced contention. If you create a linear path of progression that funnels everybody into a line without setting up ticket stampers and referees every X amount of square feet, it seems reasonable to assume that chaos will run rampant. Pantheon is supposed to be a game that offers both vertical and horizontal progression along with a variety of ways for players to progress down each path.
One of the catch phrases for this game is "Bring Friends" -- if you find yourself in a situation where you're constantly painting certain player types in a negative light, it's quite likely that you will experience issues if/when the time comes that those players would offer tremendous value in helping you conquer a given goal that is aligned with their playstyle. The best advice I can give is for folks to embrace the idea that we are all going to share a world. That doesn't mean we are going to take turns standing in lines and forming invisible quarantines wherever we want. Again, some content will be worth competing for and if you make the determination that you absolutely must experience that content, maybe you should try your hand in taking on a little bit more of a competitive mindset. Don't expect the entire world to revolve around your personal preference bubble. I like to think that most people aren't quitters.
If you are having a hard time overcoming a specific challenge, you may need to ask yourself if you're being too rigid. Do you expect that challenge to adapt to you in order to make it more manageable? That probably isn't going to happen. I know there are some crappy players out there who thrive in an environment that allows them to cause grief to others. The sad reality is that those who exhibit a very low tolerance for competition or conflict (both are inevitable) essentially label themselves as a target for the truly wicked killers who make it their business to seek those kind of players out. Expand your horizons and accept that competition/conflict can be an amazing motivator for high levels of cooperation. Accept what a melting pot world truly is and carve out a role that makes you a desirable person to play with. Be excellent to yourself and those around you and I'm willing to bet that you will attract good people who would be willing to help you out when you need it. If you have your mind made up that competitive equates with evil, you're really hampering yourself when it comes time to "Bring Friends."
Again, it's good game design to incorporate content that resonates with each player demographic. This can absolutely be achieved in a persistent world and VR has stated multiple times that they are considering various options on how they can accomplish this. There will be opportunities to explore, socialize, achieve, and even "kill" -- I use that term loosely because it doesn't literally mean killing other players. I totally understand the frustrations of those who feel that their style will be handicapped when it comes time to overcome certain challenges. At the same time, I can't help but think that some folks only make it harder on themselves in these situations because they aren't willing to branch out and take advantage of the power to network and make friends. Don't go into this with an "us vs them" mentality -- it should be a "we" mentality but it requires building rapport. Having good social skills can be incredibly powerful when it comes time to form up your network of "we and us" instead of "us vs them."
philo said:If anyone thinks VR will have the man power to even scratch the surface of being able to regulate kill stealing you are slightly out of touch with reality. That is part of the reason why it is what it is.
Most people will behave if there are clear guidelines. If they are effectively told "that's fine" then they will KS.
oneADseven said:Social and competitive design should be molded together and not seen as opposite and opposing facets of game design. In my experience, competition and conflict have always served as a driving force that compelled players to form bonds with others. This is especially true in a group-centric game where players depend on each other to overcome the many obstacles that are inherent in a persistent world. A fantasy world is not a grocery store, parking lot, or concession stand. I would strongly recommend that folks read up on the Bartles study that analyzes player behavior and motivators. We aren't segregating the population and giving the killers/socializers/explorers/achievers their own instances anymore. Terminus will be a melting pot world filled with different personalities and it's up to each and every one of us to network with others and make the most of the opportunities available.
Is that like in real society where we should make best efforts to get on with 'bully' types or face a life of meek acceptance being pushed around? Sorry, no. You can't value all members of the population when half of them are trampled all over because a few baddies are allowed to subjugate them. There's a reason in enlightened societies that "might is right" attitudes aren't tolerated and where they are you end up with warzones and misery.
Competition and conflict have nothing to do with group content. Group content is there to make people bond together and develop conplex tactics to defeat challenging PvE content. Having that group 'fight' with another group of players to even *get to* the game encounters is completely distinct and unnecessary to a group PvE game.
oneADseven said:All that said, it's simply good game design to create content that resonates with each player demographic. If there are resources that are worth competing for, you should probably seek out some of the folks who thrive in a competitive environment because competition for resources in an open-world is inherent. That doesn't mean that every single piece of content in the game is going to be competed for. Meaningful risk vs reward should naturally fan people out and alleviate forced contention. If you create a linear path of progression that funnels everybody into a line without setting up ticket stampers and referees every X amount of square feet, it seems reasonable to assume that chaos will run rampant. Pantheon is supposed to be a game that offers both vertical and horizontal progression along with a variety of ways for players to progress down each path.
There clearly are people that only value something they've had to 'compete' against other humans to get. Sure there should be mechanics for them to enjoy. Maybe elective competitive encounters that other competitive types can enjoy against each other.
That's not what is being suggested it seems by VR currently. Everything will be up for grabs. Nothing will be without the potential for competition, contention and conflict. This means every encounter will possibly involve contention and will favour those that enjoy it and irritate those that don't. No, I don't want to have to join up with a guild that enjoys conflict in order to just play the PvE game.
"competition for resources in an open-world is inherent". Open world for me is the chance to meet, share and help, not to meet, hinder and steal. Competition for resources shouldn't mean being able to exclude others from the content of the game itself.
oneADseven said:One of the catch phrases for this game is "Bring Friends" -- if you find yourself in a situation where you're constantly painting certain player types in a negative light, it's quite likely that you will experience issues if/when the time comes that those players would offer tremendous value in helping you conquer a given goal that is aligned with their playstyle. The best advice I can give is for folks to embrace the idea that we are all going to share a world. That doesn't mean we are going to take turns standing in lines and forming invisible quarantines wherever we want. Again, some content will be worth competing for and if you make the determination that you absolutely must experience that content, maybe you should try your hand in taking on a little bit more of a competitive mindset. Don't expect the entire world to revolve around your personal preference bubble. I like to think that most people aren't quitters.
I'm willing to bet if the "Bring Friends" video had shown a character or two getting pushed out of a camp and having to call in their guild mates to squabble over some KSing and push each other around, Pantheon might be getting a different reception and a different demographic in their customers.
"Bring Friends" to me meant "The content is going to be challenging and group-based. Don't expect to solo everything" not "If you don't have lots of powerful friends you are going to get pushed around regularly".
oneADseven said:If you are having a hard time overcoming a specific challenge, you may need to ask yourself if you're being too rigid. Do you expect that challenge to adapt to you in order to make it more manageable? That probably isn't going to happen. I know there are some crappy players out there who thrive in an environment that allows them to cause grief to others. The sad reality is that those who exhibit a very low tolerance for competition or conflict (both are inevitable) essentially label themselves as a target for the truly wicked killers who make it their business to seek those kind of players out. Expand your horizons and accept that competition/conflict can be an amazing motivator for high levels of cooperation. Accept what a melting pot world truly is and carve out a role that makes you a desirable person to play with. Be excellent to yourself and those around you and I'm willing to bet that you will attract good people who would be willing to help you out when you need it. If you have your mind made up that competitive equates with evil, you're really hampering yourself when it comes time to "Bring Friends."
The challenge you are overcoming should be the PvE encounters, not other players. I do not want to be forced to mix with players whose playstyle I do not enjoy in order to simply play how I like to play. I don't want to have to have a bodyguard to play PvE.
oneADseven said:Again, it's good game design to incorporate content that resonates with each player demographic. This can absolutely be achieved in a persistent world and VR has stated multiple times that they are considering various options on how they can accomplish this. There will be opportunities to explore, socialize, achieve, and even "kill" -- I use that term loosely because it doesn't literally mean killing other players. I totally understand the frustrations of those who feel that their style will be handicapped when it comes time to overcome certain challenges. At the same time, I can't help but think that some folks only make it harder on themselves in these situations because they aren't willing to branch out and take advantage of the power to network and make friends. Don't go into this with an "us vs them" mentality -- it should be a "we" mentality but it requires building rapport. Having good social skills can be incredibly powerful when it comes time to form up your network of "we and us" instead of "us vs them."
Bullying is not a social skill. Overcoming bullies is not a fun social experience whether you can do it or not. The pseudo-PvP demographic is not compatible with anything but other pseudo-PvP players. I join a guild and make friends in RPGs in order to overcome bigger and more powerful PvE encounters not in order to prevail in a squabble with other players to even get to that better PvE content.
You keep describing contention like it's a challenge us Carebears can't handle. That's not it. I play FPSs for PvP. I simply don't enjoy contention and conflict in PvE RPGs. I want PvE to be PvE.
I admire your efforts to encourage some kind of accord, but the only people happy when conflict is tolerated and allowed to dominate is those that enjoy it.
Other players are a part of the environment in a persistant world where competition for finite resources is inherent. I hope you can find competitive friends who aren't bullies (think kill "securing" instead of kill "stealing".) Players vs Content sounds like a co-op multi-player RPG, or something that can be achieved in an instance. If you consider a non-bully competitive player as nothing more than a body-guard then I don't really know what to tell you. A big part of my message was to make friends and it seems like you're very selective of who you will consider a friend as opposed to a body-guard.
Kilsin said:Porygon said:Someone coming into your "camp" and killing your mobs is not griefing or malicious. You might not like it, but it's not against any rule.
If they stay there and you compete with them for 5 hours and lose all mobs, that's still not griefing or malicious.
I assume what he means is that if someone comes and ks's you, then you leave and that person follows you around ks'ing everything you touch.. that's when it becomes griefing and malicious.
You have to put personal feelings aside and look from a logical perspective. Is said person preventing you from playing the game... no. You have the ability to walk away. If you do, and they continue harassing you, that's when theres a problem.
Spot on, Porygon, thank you :)
As history has shown repeatedly, blaming the victim is not a viable business model. I hope you and VR realize this before launch and make appropriate changes for the sake of customer retention.
As mentioned on Reddit, multi-tag (I'd never heard it described that way, but it's a nice turn of phrase) is a perfectly viable option and completely eliminates this aspect of social toxicity. People end up co-operating by design, rather than competing by design.
Sure, some of us can handle the jerkface asshats, but not the vast majority of paying customers in 2020. At least if you want to get over the 10k subscriber hurdle and sustain it or grow. But as always, it's your call. :)
oneADseven said:Other players are a part of the environment in a persistant world where competition for finite resources is inherent. I hope you can find competitive friends who aren't bullies. Players vs Content sounds like a co-op multi-player RPG, or something that can be achieved in an instance.
PvE MMORPG is literally player versus content coop multiplayer to most people, yes. The perfect open world inter-group interaction was in Jim Lee's stream where his group was having trouble, another was nearby, so they asked for help and got it.
In some people's ideal that other group would be hindering Jim Lee's group to make sure they never got through that difficult encounter, gave up and moved on so the other group could have it to themselves.
One of the very best things about RPGs from D&D onwards was finally having a game that wasn't just you beating others, it was you playing *with* you friends to beat evil monsters. Even the GM controlling the monsters was there to make sure everyone had a good time.
What MMORPGs became, at high level at least, is perhaps inevitable human nature. Some feel good when they 'beat' others. If there are no rules to stop the conflict then those people will prevail. It is no more 'inherent' than assault, burglary and murder is inherent in human society. So, yes, it is 'inherent', but that does not make it desirable or unavoidable.
Some would say it's absoultely plain and obvious that cooperation and coordination is more fun than conflict and beating others, especially in a 'game' (ie. not a professional sport or some such). Some others clearly would not say that.
The difficulty here is that having no PNP to cover it doesn't mean both sides are happy, it means the competitive contentious types run riot.
disposalist said:
Of course it's bullying. It's using your superior power to take something from someone else.
"Stealing" that drink is very much like "stealing" that content I paid to experience just like everyone else. Also, if it took me an hour to get to that monster spawn area and I earn £50 per hour normally, being pushed off that content and having to travel to and break into another equally interesting camp has a 'cost'. My time is precious.
Pushing someone off a barstool is the equivalent. If I were camping a spawn and wandered off to collect resources to come back to find someone camping it that would be like someone taking a stool I'd vacated to visit the toilet. Not as bad. Just turning up and killing the monsters I'm clearly busy killing is much more like shoving me out of my place at the bar.
It's not a perfect example, but it's very much how it feels to me. Your point that the bar incident is a 'crime' that you can call the 'police' to get justice for is exactly right. And there is no such resource in Pantheon apparently......
I just want to touch on this portion.....
While I agree, someone should not bully you from your camp, I do see issue with your example of ,"If I were camping a spawn and wandered off to collect resources to come back...". In this area you leave some variables that could make a difference, in the "Bar" scenario, your drink, hopefully not empty glass, is there, identifying to most that this space is taken, and it is common courtesy to check with the other patrons on either side or the bartender is the person is still there.
In your example, you say you wander off. How far did you wander, is there any way for a passer by to know that camp is taken? Otherwise anyone could walk up to any camp and claim they were there and wandered off to get something.
Now, getting off your particular example, and speaking in a more general form related to the topic...
In the old Days of EQ1, we had camp checks, and it was unwritten policy that if someone was camping an area/mob they had claim to it. It good faith, you did not just muscle your way in. Maybe some servers were different, but from most I knew, that was common practice.
You zone in, /shout "Camp Check". And if there were no open camps that you could get to or handle, you moved on to a new location, or asked to join an existing camp.
Is this common courtesy gone? Are there really that many selfish, rude player out there that these same basic courtesies can not exists without hard line server rules?
Fulton said: ... Is this common courtesy gone? Are there really that many selfish, rude player out there that these same basic courtesies can not exists without hard line server rules?
Yes. If EQ1, (past and present) and any similar MMO or game with similar competitive features is any indication. Personally? I've seen this toxic behavior in every MMO I've played since Meridian 59 in 1995.
The only rule is: If it can be done, it will be done.
That's why the game must prohibit the action, or the players will do it. Sure, it's more work, but in the end you get enough customers, so there's that upside. :)
Fulton said:disposalist said:Of course it's bullying. It's using your superior power to take something from someone else.
"Stealing" that drink is very much like "stealing" that content I paid to experience just like everyone else. Also, if it took me an hour to get to that monster spawn area and I earn £50 per hour normally, being pushed off that content and having to travel to and break into another equally interesting camp has a 'cost'. My time is precious.
Pushing someone off a barstool is the equivalent. If I were camping a spawn and wandered off to collect resources to come back to find someone camping it that would be like someone taking a stool I'd vacated to visit the toilet. Not as bad. Just turning up and killing the monsters I'm clearly busy killing is much more like shoving me out of my place at the bar.
It's not a perfect example, but it's very much how it feels to me. Your point that the bar incident is a 'crime' that you can call the 'police' to get justice for is exactly right. And there is no such resource in Pantheon apparently......
I just want to touch on this portion.....
While I agree, someone should not bully you from your camp, I do see issue with your example of ,"If I were camping a spawn and wandered off to collect resources to come back...". In this area you leave some variables that could make a difference, in the "Bar" scenario, your drink, hopefully not empty glass, is there, identifying to most that this space is taken, and it is common courtesy to check with the other patrons on either side or the bartender is the person is still there.
In your example, you say you wander off. How far did you wander, is there any way for a passer by to know that camp is taken? Otherwise anyone could walk up to any camp and claim they were there and wandered off to get something.
Yeah, I agree. As I said "Not as bad". But not how being pushed out of a camp feels.
Fulton said:Now, getting off your particular example, and speaking in a more general form related to the topic...In the old Days of EQ1, we had camp checks, and it was unwritten policy that if someone was camping an area/mob they had claim to it. It good faith, you did not just muscle your way in. Maybe some servers were different, but from most I knew, that was common practice.
You zone in, /shout "Camp Check". And if there were no open camps that you could get to or handle, you moved on to a new location, or asked to join an existing camp.
Is this common courtesy gone? Are there really that many selfish, rude player out there that these same basic courtesies can not exists without hard line server rules?
I'm hoping that sort of common courtesy will be... er... common :)
*But* We *know* from recent games (and even EQ P99) that there *are* players who will run rough-shod over others and care not one jot for courtesy of any kind.
Simple PNP would mean that there is at least a basis for challenging their behaviour and building a 'case' against them and eventually reporting them.
Without even decent PNP they are not *being* discourtious, officially, and people have no basis whatsoever for even asking them to stop what they are doing never mind reporting them.
I have faith that a lot of players will play nice without a PNP. I also have faith that if there is *no* PNP covering this area, that there will be enough bullies to turn things sour pretty regularly.
I know this because it has happened in other MMOs without PNP and other MMOs have added PNP to cover it because it started mucking things up.
PNP is not 'hard line server rules'. Is doesn't have to be that way at all. It can just be guidelines that outline some scenarios and indicate what good and bad behaviour might be considered given 20 years of MMORPG experience of such scenarios and taking into consideration the limitations of the mechanics of the game.
All I would like is to be able to say to someone who is being a prat "Hey there. You know what you're doing is against the PNP? Let's share this or join together or something?". A lot of the time, in my experience, that is all it takes. They will know it's against the PNP and is rude or whatever and will move on or join up with you and become a friend. Some will question it and go read the rules because they literally didn't know. Some will tell you to screw yourself and then you report them and maybe that single report does nothing, but if it's the 50th that person will get some GM action.
The point is, with inadequate PNP (and, yes, I think the trigger level being repeat, pattern harassment and anything less is nothing is inadequate) there is no guidance and no recourse for those having their experience ruined.
So I have never heard of a "play nice policy" before this forums thread. I will mention again here what I mentioned in a different thread; I am concerned with concepts from EQ vanilla being implemented in this game with the expectation that everyone intuitively will follow or even know of them. Case in Point: I have been playing A LOT of MMOs since 2001. In not a single game can I recall ever even hearing in conversation the words "Camp Check". Until this post, I did NOT KNOW that this thing existed.
All I am saying is that what was the norm, maybe, in EQ may very well be a foreign concept to those that never played EQ. Not everyone has been exposed to PNP or "Camp Check" or a thousand other EQ nuances. Saying that though; It is easy enough to create and affirm this concept starting at level one with properly implemented game mechanics.
Yes the old EQ/DAOC respect for camps is basically gone. It isn't simply a matter of rudeness - most people simply don't think that because you are in an area you have some "right" to every mob in that area. They think you are rude if you say that no one should do their own killing anywhere near you. Those of us from the old "camp" games may be a majority on this forum but we are a tiny minority in games.
On the kill stealing topic - I wouldn't say that giving sole credit and sole loot to whoever does the most damage is bad. Bad is far too weak a word. It is terrible. It is awful. It is atrocious. It has the potential to kill the game outright.
It boggles the mind (mine is easily boggled) to think that any game developer in its right mind would allow high levels to come into a low level area where people are trying to decide whether to buy/subscribe/stay with the game and one shot mobs that the low level has been fighting so the low level gets nothing. Its bad enough if some high level comes in and kills all the mobs that no one has engaged yet, making it hard for people that *belong* in the area to go about their business.
To me it is obvious beyond dispute that if you do not allow shared credit for a kill (which makes a lot of sense in a "social" game) you should at least let whoever pulls the mob keep it without fear of kill-stealing.
Appologies in advance for the long post, I really do hope you will actually read it (especially Kilsin). Sorry there is no TL/DR version as I think it's all important and there is context. The people I quote in this post are as follows: Porygon, Kilsin, Zorkon, evogelion (OP), oneADseven, philo.
Porygon said: Someone coming into your "camp" and killing your mobs is not griefing or malicious.
Aside from you using the word 'camp' this part is false. If you are killing a mob or mobs and somebody sees this and chooses to take them from you, it IS griefing and it IS malicious.
Porygon said: You might not like it, but it's not against any rule.
This part is true. According to Kilsin it is not against any rule. The debate is if it SHOULD be a rule.
Porygon said: If they stay there and you compete with them for 5 hours and lose all mobs, that's still not griefing or malicious.
Again, this is not true. It's not against the rules, but it's still griefing to steal somebodies mobs for 5 hours. Just because it's not against a rule doesn't mean it's still not malicious. Just because something is not against a rule doesn't not mean it's not wrong. In some places in the world you can legally beat your wife if she disobeys you, but this does not mean it's not malicious and wrong.
You do have the right to pack up and move on though and if it's just experience farming then that's probably your best option, since you can get experience anywhere.
Since what I am talking about is not experience farming and is in fact going after a specific target, the act of willfully stealing that target from the one who cleared to it, that's the stealing (aka griefing) part.
Porygon said: I assume what he means is that if someone comes and ks's you, then you leave and that person follows you around ks'ing everything you touch.. that's when it becomes griefing and malicious.
You are correct, this is most likely what Kilsin views as the malicious or harassing that would be against the rules. We would like him to expand his viewpoint to include the FIRST time they grief you to be against the rules too.
Porygon said: You have to put personal feelings aside and look from a logical perspective. Is said person preventing you from playing the game... no. You have the ability to walk away. If you do, and they continue harassing you, that's when theres a problem.
The 'Logical perspective' as you called it, is that they are preventing you from completing the goals that you were working on in the game. Yes you could leave and go work on something else, but this does not take into account the large time and effort commitment you already put into working your way through a dungeon to get to a spot to try and kill a named boss. Challenges have been overcome, plans made, and teamwork was probably involved. So then out of the blue shows up another group, perhaps who followed behind you not even needing to kill any of the mobs (since you and your group did all the work) and then swoops in at the last minute to claim the boss kill and all the loot. In my understanding of Logic, this is a malicious act of stealing what another group earned. Just because the group could say "oh well let's go do something else" doesn't mean it wasn't stealing and harassment and griefing and all the other words that mean they did a bad thing.
You are suggesting that you just say "Oh well... C'est la vie... Put my personal feelings aside... It's not against the rules... I have the ability to walk away and do something else... hopefully they don't follow me to the next place I go and steal from me again because 'that's when there's a problem'."
For a game company to tell me ahead of time that they are totally ok with this kind of behaviour because "You don't have to be doing what you were doing for hours to try to get to that boss... you could always try something else instead." Well that's a really big kick in the teeth.
Kilsin said: Spot on, Porygon, thank you :)
See this is what I'm afraid of. Kilsin is basically telling us that according to VR's point of view, griefing is ok and they aren't going to make any rules against it. Only if they grief you over and over will they decide "Ok maybe your over doing it and now we need to step in. Don't you know you can only KS somebody a couple times and then you need to stop."
The problem is, if the "ONE" time KSing you is the most important boss mob that you just spent all that effort and time to get to, then Oh Well... guess your SOL.
If I can go back and re-quote something I quoted above.
Porygon said: they continue harassing you, that's when theres a problem.
Even YOU understand that KS'ing even once is still harassing. You say that if they 'continue' to harass you then it's wrong. So Harassing once is fine and not against the rules... it's only wrong if they harass you multiple times over a period of time. Do you think that kind of thing would work for other types of things. "Well officer... I only sexually harrassed the woman the one time, it's not like I kept sexually harassing her over and over" ... "Oh well then that's totally fine... Mrs, don't you realize that if he only sexually harasses you that one time it's not against any rules." Of course we wouldn't accept that kind of Logic.
Zorkon said: What is being discussed in this thread is Camp Stealing and in EQ "Camps" were not recognized by management. I don't think they should be recognized here by VR eather...
First off you are incorrect... from the first post in this thread:
evogelion said: I personally can't stand those who lurk about to steal kills, cause other players to die through means other than pvp, and muscle their way into your enjoyment while pushing you out. Nothing is worse than having to be the "little guy" being walked over by the "bully". Pantheon should be hard on those few that ruin the experiences of others for their own enjoyment, ego and greed.
This thread was about wanting Pantheon to have rules and 'be hard on' players who do things that ruin the experiences of others. Kilsin then clarified for us that while Training is going to be an offense, Kill Stealing was not going to be an offense. We are not talking about Camp stealing, we are discussing actions like Kill Stealing and killing other players through training and such or bullying them.
Zorkon said: first hit and it's yours...
You are thinking of World of Warcraft where First to Engage is the way it works. From my understanding VR has not said if they will be using EQ1's Most Damage, or WoW's First to Engage rules in regards to who gets credit for a kill and thus the loot.
Zorkon said: People seem to be using the dreaded "Kill Stealing" name to justify them wanting certain mobs reserved for just for them.... in an open world!
We are pretty sure that VR is going to have things Dynamic enough that there won't usually be a clear 'Camp' for bosses in the normal world and dungeons. Bosses will spawn in multiple locations and perhaps even move around the zone once they spawn. So claiming a 'Camp' isn't really going to give you any way to claim a boss camp spot or in your words "reserved for just them".
When it becomes Kill Stealing is when a boss has been scouted and a group works to it, only to have another group come in from behind and nab the boss as or before the first group engages. This is what I am talking about when I say "Kill Stealing". I am not trying to justify mobs being reserved. But if my group does all the work to clear to the boss and then your group swoops in behind me and takes the boss, I'm saying that this is what should be against the play nice policy and the GM's should be involved.
If on the other hand we both see the boss from different sides of the area and start clearing to it from different directions, and your group just gets there first... that's fair and not Kill stealing. I might be sad, but I'm not going to blame you for stealing. That is where the Competition part of the game comes in.
oneADseven said: The sad reality is that those who exhibit a very low tolerance for competition or conflict (both are inevitable) essentially label themselves as a target for the truly wicked killers who make it their business to seek those kind of players out. Expand your horizons and accept that competition/conflict can be an amazing motivator for high levels of cooperation.
I know that you actually said a lot more than that oneADseven and I do understand where you are coming from and you did make some good points. Sorry for not quoting everything but this post is gonna be long enough.
I do think that some of the people on this thread are equating 'Competing' with 'Kill Stealing'. Competition is not what we are worried about in this specific converstaion. I don't mind competition. The problem I'm worried about is when people do not compete at all but rather just swoop in to steal. Kill Stealing is not a healthy competition where one group/person simply beats the other group/person to the prize. It's when the one group/person slyly waits for the other group/player to do all the work and then just takes the spoils (in this case the kill).
Competition and 'high levels of cooperation' is why in my previous post on the subject I said that I had no interest in instancing and I'm glad that Pantheon is not using instancing. But this does not mean that I think KS'ing is alright and should be allowed. I do wonder if maybe this is why Kilsin seems to think that KS'ing is ok... he's just assuming it's all part of healthy competition and the loser should just accept that sometimes you win and sometimes you lose.
So let me direct this at Kilsin... Healthy competition and Kill Stealing are TWO (ie 2) different things and should be treated differently. One is ok... the other is wrong and should be against the rules. It should clearly be stated in those rules what the difference is between those two things and when it crosses over from healthy competition into clear deliberate kill stealing.
philo said: If anyone thinks VR will have the man power to even scratch the surface of being able to regulate kill stealing you are slightly out of touch with reality. That is part of the reason why it is what it is.
This is false. It IS possible to regulate most kill stealing. You won't stop all of it, but there ARE ways you can police this successfully even with a limited GM team. The key is totally in the tools they set up to let them actually SEE what happend. If you are thinking that they just have to go by 'He said, He Said' then yeah you won't have a hope of knowing if KS'ing really happend. But there are ways that a GM should be able to actually load up the logs from the time period in question and actually have his client Visually watch what happend from each players PoV. He won't be able to read the players mind to know what he was thinking, but he can clearly watch what he does in game and know if that was a clear intent to steal a kill away from a player or group who did all the work to get there.
I already brought up how this could be done in a previous post: https://www.pantheonmmo.com/content/forums/topic/8659/death-cam-type-feature-as-a-gm-tool/view/post_id/164166
Where I explained how a GM client of the game could be set up to load up the raw log data that the server records and have it display the point of view of the players that raw data was origional created and sent too. So he would see what happend just like the players saw it. And he can clearly make the call of if a group swoops in to kill a boss that the other group clearly did the work to clear to.
So this CAN be done. It's just up to VR to actually make the rule and enforce it. As I said in my previous post in this thread, once you create the rule and actually start enforcing it... most of the kill stealing will end as players will not want to risk getting banned. There might still be cases of it when people just get greedy and they think they can get away with it, but the majority of it (especially the premeditated ks'ing) will stop.
Kilsin I know that all of you at VR don't want this to be a rule and at this point you don't plan for it to be a rule... but please reconsider, because I really want pantheon to succeed and I'm really afraid that people are going to start quitting as soon as they realize that nothing happens when people grief you by KS'ing. As I said before, this was the one thing that none of my friends liked about EQ1 and regardless of all the other great things we loved about that game none of us would go back to EQ1 for that one major reason.
Take this to the rest of the team and explain our point of view for us. I know that not all the Dev's will read all these forum posts so you need to be our champion on this. Even if you don't agree with me, you still should pass this on and talk about it again, because it's the success of your game on the line here and we want it to be great and right now you are suggesting to me that when lots of people are going to have bad experiences there is going to be no help from the GM's and that's going to make them get fed up and leave.
PS. I thank anyone who actually read through this post (you may not agree with me, but at least you read it).
Goofy - I don't necessarily disagree with any of your conclusions but I *do* disagree with your interpretation of the term "griefing".
Griefing, and I suspect most of us would agree, goes beyond selfishness or rudeness. It goes beyond someone wanting mobs and taking them even though you are there first. It goes beyond someone wanting a boss and taking it after you cleared the way to it.
Griefing by general definition means doing things specifically directed at another player with the intent to harm that player. It means an intent to cause another player grief, not simply doing something for one's own benefit without caring if it hurts another player. By analogy, think of the distinction between amoral and immoral.
If I steal your boss or mobs once there is no way to prove it is griefing unless I come out and say it is. If I do it to the same player over and over, now there is clear evidence of a violation of anti-griefing rules.
I don't think kill-stealing should be allowed. I don't think training should be allowed. I think the game mechanics should prevent either of these so they cannot even be done once. But neither is griefing without a specific intent to do them to hurt someone else not to help yourself.
Dashed said:So I have never heard of a "play nice policy" before this forums thread. I will mention again here what I mentioned in a different thread; I am concerned with concepts from EQ vanilla being implemented in this game with the expectation that everyone intuitively will follow or even know of them. Case in Point: I have been playing A LOT of MMOs since 2001. In not a single game can I recall ever even hearing in conversation the words "Camp Check". Until this post, I did NOT KNOW that this thing existed.
All I am saying is that what was the norm, maybe, in EQ may very well be a foreign concept to those that never played EQ. Not everyone has been exposed to PNP or "Camp Check" or a thousand other EQ nuances. Saying that though; It is easy enough to create and affirm this concept starting at level one with properly implemented game mechanics.
The tricky thing is camps were a player-defined thing, not game-defined.
Players worked out what area of monsters was 'doable' by a group and those areas got known by names over time. It was a way for players to not waste time treading on each others' toes. Basically, a 'camp' would support one group and if another came along neither of them would have a challenging or rewarding time, so when you entered a zone you'd ask those in zone what camps were already occupied to give you an quick idea of where would be good for you to set up.
Sometimes people/groups *would* share camps, but more often than not if a zone was overcrowded or if someone was 'camping' a particular area because a particular monster there dropped a particular item they needed then someone else muscling in would cause unpleasantness. It was considered rude just like jumping a queue or squeezing onto your seat with you - that kind of thing.
You're absolutely right, I think, that possibly a majority of Pantheon players will have no concept of old-school-style MMORPG etiquette which is why relying on 'the community' for self-policing is crazy when the game-makers have decades of relevent experience from which to work out guidelines/PNP. Old-school-etiquette isn't necessarily ideal, but having *none* defined is horrendous.
Just having PNP written and published would avoid a huge amount of aggro - most people will *want* to be courtious but simply don't know what that *is* in an MMORPG or indeed specifically in Pantheon.
I really must stop posting about this. It's clear what I think by now I guess.
GoofyWarriorGuy said:
philo said: If anyone thinks VR will have the man power to even scratch the surface of being able to regulate kill stealing you are slightly out of touch with reality. That is part of the reason why it is what it is.
This is false. It IS possible to regulate most kill stealing. You won't stop all of it, but there ARE ways you can police this successfully even with a limited GM team. The key is totally in the tools they set up to let them actually SEE what happend. If you are thinking that they just have to go by 'He said, He Said' then yeah you won't have a hope of knowing if KS'ing really happend. But there are ways that a GM should be able to actually load up the logs from the time period in question and actually have his client Visually watch what happend from each players PoV. He won't be able to read the players mind to know what he was thinking, but he can clearly watch what he does in game and know if that was a clear intent to steal a kill away from a player or group who did all the work to get there.
I already brought up how this could be done in a previous post: https://www.pantheonmmo.com/content/forums/topic/8659/death-cam-type-feature-as-a-gm-tool/view/post_id/164166
Where I explained how a GM client of the game could be set up to load up the raw log data that the server records and have it display the point of view of the players that raw data was origional created and sent too. So he would see what happend just like the players saw it. And he can clearly make the call of if a group swoops in to kill a boss that the other group clearly did the work to clear to.
So this CAN be done. It's just up to VR to actually make the rule and enforce it. As I said in my previous post in this thread, once you create the rule and actually start enforcing it... most of the kill stealing will end as players will not want to risk getting banned. There might still be cases of it when people just get greedy and they think they can get away with it, but the majority of it (especially the premeditated ks'ing) will stop.
I read it!
I found the part about them pulling up their own videos of the perspectives of each character quite interesting! I've always pictured it being the customer who must provide the video from their own records. Still, wouldn't storing this many different videos for say, weeks at a time, due to the fact that VR can't get to every issue very quickly, going to be hard even with current storage capabilities? or do all of these videos somehow only count as one big awesome video or something? I am not technologically awakened.
((most people will *want* to be courtious but simply don't know what that *is* in an MMORPG or indeed specifically in Pantheon.))
Much like the endless debates over what need versus greed means in rolling for loot.
Back in the day it was generally accepted that "need" meant the character rolling could use the item as an upgrade for itself.
Over the years more and more people rolled "need" on everything and seemed to genuinely not understand the difference between needing the specific item and needing gold (which almost everyone does) so that any sellable item is "need". Some were just greedy or stupid but many didn't want to be rude they just had no idea what "need" meant. Ditto with the concept of a "camp".
disposalist said:philo said:If anyone thinks VR will have the man power to even scratch the surface of being able to regulate kill stealing you are slightly out of touch with reality. That is part of the reason why it is what it is.
Most people will behave if there are clear guidelines. If they are effectively told "that's fine" then they will KS.
Instating rules that can't be enforced isn't a viable solution.
Most people will behave regardless.
The whole concept of 'camping' is a player invention. It's what players decided was the most effecient way to get what was important to them, loot. It was never intended by Verant/SOE/DBG that players would sit in one spot, kill the same set of npc's and wait for them to show up again for hours on end. That is something players imposed on themselves. It makes no sense to ask the company to enforce player made rules that fall outside the design of the game.
Given what we have seen of Visionary Realms stance on this topic so far I think it's safe to say that 'camps' are NOT a part of the vision of Pantheon. That is a good thing. Sitting around waiting for NPC's to spawn is a really boring adventure.
BeaverBiscuit said: I found the part about them pulling up their own videos of the perspectives of each character quite interesting! I've always pictured it being the customer who must provide the video from their own records. Still, wouldn't storing this many different videos for say, weeks at a time, due to the fact that VR can't get to every issue very quickly, going to be hard even with current storage capabilities? or do all of these videos somehow only count as one big awesome video or something? I am not technologically awakened.
They aren't storing a video... they are storing the text data that is sent to the player that tells his client what to show him. So when you do something in the game, the server has to send you the data that tells your client program what to show you on the screen. Your client then pulls up the corresponding game files that it needs to show you that on your screen, such as avatars and items and zone files, even sound effects. They are all stored on your computer and your client pulls them up based on what the data coming over your internet connection tells it.
We know that in other MMOs the game stores this game data so that GM's can refer to it for whatever purposes they have, such as statistics and so they can resolve issues of items going poof or whatever. So we know that data is stored. If the GM's create a version of the client that they can use that allows them to re-load that stored data, and view it in that client they can basically re-watch what the player saw on his screen as he played the game.
So they are not saving a .mpg or whatever other video format people would use... they are instead just loading up a section of the 'data stream' that was logged by the server and then having their client show it to them.
Of course if VR does this is a totally different question... I'm just saying it should be possible. Go read my other thread if you want, because this might be getting off topic for this thread and Kilsin may delete this post.
Lyyr said:The whole concept of 'camping' is a player invention. It's what players decided was the most effecient way to get what was important to them, loot. It was never intended by Verant/SOE/DBG that players would sit in one spot, kill the same set of npc's and wait for them to show up again for hours on end. That is something players imposed on themselves. It makes no sense to ask the company to enforce player made rules that fall outside the design of the game.
Given what we have seen of Visionary Realms stance on this topic so far I think it's safe to say that 'camps' are NOT a part of the vision of Pantheon. That is a good thing. Sitting around waiting for NPC's to spawn is a really boring adventure.
Hmm I am quite sure they said exactly that in one of the streams that the crawling they are showing right now in the stream is not what they intend. They intend camping and have the mana regen breaks as a good oportunity to chat and maybe make new friends.