The difference is that you've been playing for years. The n00bs haven't.

I don't depent on self-control (although if I didn't have any, the things I could do...).
But in the state it is in now, we can't depend on Sherpa. He's a person, like you or me.
He can't be ingame 24/7. So we must depend on each other. So show some self-control, all of you.



--Rogue


(If this looks funny, it's because I'm typing it in links, which doesn't have line-wrap support...

I thought you no longer used globabl chat, camps? Also, you weren't really hanging there before we attacked you.

Second, THIS IS NOT A FRELLING RPG ONLY CAMPS! Go play Pen and Paper D&D, We have no reason to respect your RP, get us to it, adapt, and consider... No one crosses the shadow theives and lives:P

Piro, you should really try reading the forum rules. No Fucking Flaming.

/me watches his thread descend into a flame war *sniff*

Piro, see, with that attitude, we need the external regulations. Why not live and let live? Because some people have gripes against others that boil over into the chat. My point of using multilog is to avoid general chat when I want to.

The point is that NOW is the time to be attracting players to this game, to form a solid userbase for when it goes p2p. As much of the atmosphere and RPing of the eventual product needs to be on outward display as is possible, and Camps' topic is just touching on this. Vendetta IS a glorified chat room, and games like Hostile Space and EVN are not. Its the gameplay changes that will make this game and shape the community, and the selfishness of basic human nature will almost certainly prevail- through laziness. If its EASIER to get in a career path, to stay alive by gaining reputation with respect to your government, to trade because pirating is so damn risky, people will do that. Vendetta's goal should be to make ideas like these as varied as possible.
But then ive missed my own point, havent I. Whilst it may be extremely unlikely that we'll see a total reform in the attitudes of players with the test in its current state, we need to at least think before we act, think who may be online, and think that we could be driving away another $10 a month from guildsoft if we cause people to leave due to this bickering.

Oh yeah, I would not consider railgunning, rocket-charging/ramming, or backpedalling to be cheap.

Just those bloody swarms. ;)

As long as you dont damage yourselve by using a weapon, then in my book it isnt cheap. If swarms hurt the person that shot them and the target, then it is cheap, if they only hit the the target, then it is taking advantage of a weapons advantage, it has more then enough weaknesses.

It is difficult as hell getting railed when you arent hanging just on your place, so I dont mind. But every weapon when misused is possibly dangerous and cheap. But we need to take some actions to solve it. I gave up on the game, and ony come back occasionally because nothing what I could do helped, I trained newbies a bit, so they could take car eof themselves, slightly, but still vets who dont have anything else to do then pick on them "your roleplaying pkers", kill them over and over. And almost all the newbs that I trained and that got pissed at not being able to have a bit of fun, all quit the game or started taking away somebody elses fun. I was so let down because of it, and because of the general tendency of the community that it was acceptable, because it is only a rp aspect that I stopped playing completely. And I oly hop on from time to time, to see the ingame behaviour. And in reality it still hasnt changed one bit :(.

And yes sircamps, as long as their arent external regulations, then you need to take it on yourselve to change it, not dump it on the devs plate. they will come to this eventually, but dont misuse flaws in the test because they already know the flaw, they only dont have that much time to dedicate themselves to solve it yet. So for the moment, the internal regulations need to be much more exagerated then when their are external regulations put in play. You need to be more self controlled then when there are exterrnal regulations "like laws" put into the game.

But for this to succeed, the VETS, and all of them, need to take this into account, and work on it. Because if 1 person that is a vet denounces it, then after a time the rest will follow, since it is a vicious circle. I could kill newbie over and over to, it aint difficult, I only cant bring myself to it, to do this, since I wouldnt wish it to happen when I would be a newbie.

cheers

Life's a bitch ain't it! ;-)

If vendetta would be life then it was, but since it is only a game, vendetta shouldnt be a bitch :D. Not to mention that you are insulting all the botches out there by comparing them with a man :p.

cheers

"and I was born in a cabin I built with my own hands..."

Really, Rene, your personal experience with Vendetta is interesting and intriguing, but HARDLY can be considered as solid evidence. However, what you said demonstrated what I said earlier (read up) about playing to have fun. It's why we play games, period. Not to do service to others, but to have fun. again, do not assume that I am going around PKing everyone in sight. I am not.

It's like insta-nuking Rags. You can't just say "OK nobody do this," because they will. That sort of bug required dev interaction (removing avalons). The same goes with player-killing. It is unrealistic to say "ok nobody player-kill, it offends my [or even most players'] sense of morality." I once had that outlook. I tried to protect newbies and traders (the DSG). However, all the vets turned against me, and DS's would just be attacked for being in a sector. The "good ol' boys" wanted to keep "old school" practices alive, and the DSG was a perceived threat to this. Say what you will about the DSG after I left, but while I was there, the stated goal was to protect those who had no interest in combat. Didn't work.

I agree with the essence of what you're saying, however. The community sucks. However, instead of asking people to exhibit self-control, I would rather see external regulations put in place. Self-control in computer games is nearly non-existent. Read Pirogoeth2's post about 5 posts back. That is the attitude many experienced players have: "I don't care about your f---ing RPing." What's implied is "[and I'm gonna be blowing the hell out of you]."

Uncledave, excellent post! Guys, he's right. People PK because it's the easiest way to have fun in the game. Running from 18 to 1 is fun only for your first two million (for most people). People PK because it's easy and fun. What if the core sectors (7, 9, 11) had defbots that automatically attack people with certain reputations? What if the fringe sectors (14, 15, 5, 13) could hire militias to attack the same people? All of a sudden, being a PKer just got hard, and the only ones who would keep doing it are those who are intent on RPing the role of a pirate/outlaw/criminal. It no longer is the path of least resistance. But these are all _external_ regulations.

I guess what I'm saying is this: Asking for internal regulations may work not (and then again, might not), but it is both unrealistic and naïve to expect the same internal regulations to work in a real computer game with thousands of players. External regulations are required to curb OOC and un-realistic behavior.

SirCamps's post, simplified:


I don't like self-control, and I think it's useless. Since nobody has any, particularly me, just make the devs do everything. Don't even try to ask people to exert self-control, just institute bannings all around.

Roguelazer's post: I'm right and you're wrong.

Sircamp's previous post: Asking for internal regulations may work (and then again, might not), but it is both unrealistic and naïve to expect the same internal regulations to work in a real computer game with thousands of players. External regulations are required to curb OOC and un-realistic behavior.

EDIT: really Rogue, straw man arguments will not help anyone here. This is a real problem that deserves attention, misrepresenting what I am saying will only exacerbate the problem and delay any meaningful discussion on the subject and possibly prolong a solution.

The thing is, we don't have thousands of players right now. I've never seen more than 60 at a time. And if 60 people can't behave themselves, then that's 60 very strange people.

It's not that they can't, it's that they won't. They play to have fun. They have to exhibit enough self-control in life. Gaming is a way to kick up your feet, shoot the breeze (or someone else), and have fun. When you start burdening everyone with political rules ("don't do this, or that, or that, or that"), it no longer becomes fun. What they can and can't do should be very clear, and should be governed by external regulations. The internal ones should decide career path, not if people are going to think you're a cheap griefer or not.

Butting in for a moment.

Camps, Rogue, you are both long time, respected players, why are you acting like 6 year olds on a car trip

"did not"
"did too"
"did not"
"stop it"
"you stop it"
"you started it"
"did not"
"did too"
etc etc

On to the points i really wanted to make.
to Camps: The reality of the situation is that no amount of external regulation is ever going to solve all of the problems. I agree with you that by adding structuresd to the game (reputation, station defenses, missions, and so on) a certain amount of the PK'ing can be dealt with. There will always be PK's Pirates, Griefers and lamers in the game, in any multiplayer online game for that matter. The only way to avoid it is to have a specific group, under 24/7 monitoring with severely restricted access, and thats no way to make money.
However, until the devs have time to add the structure to the game in order to make it more controlled, the players that we should be attempting to entice into the playerbase ARE going to suffer. Players who enjoy BEING griefers IMO are more likely to remain in the community right now because that is the norm. Some self retraint on the part of the players could help us to also keep those players who are interested in the space sim/rpg elements of the game. This doesnt mean I expect it to occur, since i tend to agree that most people will seek the lowest acceptable trend of behavior, and very few will self govern themselves, a fact that i find sad, but cant do anything about.

to Rogue: Expecting even 10 players to behave in a reasonable and high minded manner is well unreasonable. There is a very true cliche (they become cliche's because they are true, ya know) "One bad apple will ruin the barrel" Any time you have a gathering of different people, either online in a game or in a public place, there is the chance that one person can act in a manner to ruin it for everyone. In society there are laws and regulations that present a limit on such behavior, often keeping it to the status of annoying instead of intolerable. If a game does not have similar, ENFORCED rules and laws, nothing can be done and one person can choose create as much havoc and trouble as they want. In the event that guilds were better supported, with ways to adjust membership and provide penalties for errant members, then there would be some option for player imposed morality on a limited scale. For instance a guild dedicated to keeping a trade route clear for it's members and associates might be able to survive if errant members could be removed from the guild before they created so much havoc as to destroy the guilds reputation, allowing that group to impose a simple form of player justice on the area they operated in.
As far as 60 "strange" people, OF COURSE WE'RE STRANGE YOU SILLY GOOF we're here aren't we? how normal would you consider people who have created entire websites devoted to a game that isn't even completed when they aren't even getting paid to do so? Just out of curiosity, how many hours a week do you devote to vendetta, either playing or working on vendetta related projects? How much benefit do you get from said projects? How many of us check the vendetta boards before we even grab our own personal e-mail. However, just because some of us are devoted to playing the game doesnt mean that we all are interested in making the game prosper. It would seem to me that an intelligent person would realize that keeping the community clean now will improve the chances for a better game later, but not everyone is intelligent. Sadly some people cant think past the here and now. Anyway i think i've rambled way off topic,

summary:
the game is going to need some built in controls and more importantly some game affecting PENALTIES for in game behavior. However, once there is some better form of guild system in place where guilds and player organizations are supported and governable by the creators, player organized morals can have some effect in certain aspects of the game, and should be encouraged.

Are we there yet? :P

Your summary, spell, is what I've been getting at, in a roundabout way. Until external regulations are put in place, internal regulations will be insufficient. And in some examples, I've shown where there will be legitimate griefing and PKing going on. Something for everyone, I say.

Right.

Firstly, the winking smiley indicated I was joking about the swarms. Irony/sarcasm/whatever.

Secondly, a slightly larger map with the perimeter sectors "safe" (NPC protected) and the central/secret sectors not, would solve a lot. On the outside players could trade in relative peace- those who attacked them would get a bunch of nasty defbots on them. And a bunch of turrets. Basically an NPC-enforced low-profit almost-safe area, so people can pick and choose who and when they want to fight. Wouldnt even take a reputation system, just stations that note down hostile players and fire on people for a period of time after infractions of the no-fire rule.

Rogue, you havent got a clue. You assume that the less people are on, the less proportion will be assholes. Doesnt work like that.

I like this idea, Dave.

Summary: Add several extra nation sectors with profitable trading between them. Restrict new pilots from venturing beyond each "nation's" territory before some tutorials are completed.

Devs, perhaps we could have three extra sectors linking to 4, 6, and 12. These would all have defbots, and function like normal sectors, with nice modular stations and all. They would have specific widgets that max out at 5400 or whatever the normal widgets are at. Independent and hidden sectors could get a slight price boost for those daring (or competent) enough to trade "in the open." Couple that with some "militia" craft and required tutorials to gain access beyond the sectors, and we might have a much more friendly game.

No Dave, I don't assume that. I assume that we, who aren't really assholes, can manage to keep self-control. You must remember that that person you're randomly killing isn't a robot, it's another person who has no idea who you are and what's going on, and is probably very confused.

I propose that those of us who don't want to be assholes take it upon ourselves to train and defend n00bs from those that are rather try to justify their actions. If enough "good" people get together, they can combat the "bad." Too few of the former and too much of the latter is what causes problems and justification for those actions only promotes it by discouraging the "good" from fighting back.

indeed.
i still don't get it why we who try to defend new players/single players from being griefed have to provide reasons why we try to convince the griefer of acting otherwise.

i do think that i can demand from other people to exert self-control upon themselves because i mostly manage to do so as well (i think...). if someone can't do that, he's in my opinion weaker than i am. i will not have this little piece of satisfaction taken from me, since it's what keeps me in-game even if griefers are on.

and to touch on the subject of internal and external regulations:
it is not just by punishment that people have scruples about their actions, or else we'd need one policeman to watch one citizen (speaking metaphorically...).
there are things called morals, and the basic morals we know are inherited, taught and perceived.
you can lose your morals, and you can gain them again. but it depends on you yourself, not on others, after a certain point (usually coming of age).