Will bounty hunting be a thing and what will it look like?

[Amos.37]

A couple of people have already said in various threads that they want bounty hunters to be a thing in this game.
Obviously, when players can respawn, bounty hunting becomes a bit of a moot point. So what incentive is their to place a bounty on someone if it doesn't have any lasting impact other than to inconvenience the player being hunted?
And how would another player collect on the bounty? Will their be an in-game log that records player kills? Will there be a way to identify a destroyed exo? (I like this idea, that the hunter would need to collect a piece of the destroyed target and present it as proof of kill).
Would bounties need to be taken in alive and would that even be possible? I don't like the idea that players can be imprisoned, because that system could be severely abused to ruin the game for people.
And, as previously said, since players respawn, what impact would a bounty have on the target other than to be annoying while it lasts?

 

[Recatek]

It sounds cool in theory but I don't think it will pan out in practice. The death penalty isn't terribly punishing and there really isn't much else to gain from it. Even if there were an automated in-game system for doing so, what's to stop my buddy from claiming my bounty, immediately reviving me a meter away, and then splitting the resulting payout with me?

 

[totoro]

Bounties will probably be on ships, with proof in the form of transponder

 

[Amos.37]

I like the idea of bounties being on ships rather than players. This gives a bit more meaningful impact, as ships are more expensive than an exo (just how much more remains to be seen). While a sizable faction losing a ship wouldn't matter much, a small group or single pirate losing a ship would be a bigger economic hit.

It also could lead to different kinds of bounties:
-Reclaim for stolen ships (deliver ship back to registered owner).
-Steal for valuable ships (deliver ship to 3rd party).
-Kill orders for troublesome ships (deliver transponder as proof of kill).

 

[PopeUrban]

Bounties don't work in MMOs because prisons and the death penalty don't work in MMOs.

Bounties rest on the assumption that an anonymous third party actor can inconvenience the target by limiting their mobility or wealth and get paid for it.

In an MMO this translates to the bounty target collecting their own bounty almost exclusively. The only bounty hunting system that has ever worked well was the SWG jedi bounty system, and the only reason it worked was because of permadeath which prevented the target from collecting their own bounty without sacrificing something worth more than the bounty.

Either the bounty is so low its not worth attempting to collect, or so high that the target collects it via alts or friends. This is a system multiple developers have tried desparately to make functional and they've all discovered the same thing. Unless you have extreme death penalties player bounty systems are so easy to game they're useless for their intended purpose.

 

[Cmdr Sovereing171]

I think we could model Elite: Dangerous bounty system in some form or way.

 

[CalenLoki]

I think we could model Elite: Dangerous bounty system in some form or way.

There are no NPCs in the game, so no chance for that.

Only way I could see it is if you can check who declared certain person as "enemy".
I.e. you look at someone, and it pops up "he's wanted criminal in the kingdom".
Then you think how you could help the kingdom, and how you can prove it.
Maybe destroy his ship and capture on video? Maybe follow the wanted person and give kingdom location of his hideout?

Basically ability to add information to someone's CV, that will be visible only to people who follow your advice.

 

[Cmdr Sovereing171]

There are no NPCs in the game, so no chance for that.

Only way I could see it is if you can check who declared certain person as "enemy".
I.e. you look at someone, and it pops up "he's wanted criminal in the kingdom".
Then you think how you could help the kingdom, and how you can prove it.
Maybe destroy his ship and capture on video? Maybe follow the wanted person and give kingdom location of his hideout?

Basically ability to add information to someone's CV, that will be visible only to people who follow your advice.

But there're Human ships, I could understand that the devs could link the death log to who effectively gets the accredited kill. They would visit the kingdom to catch in their bounty?

 

[CalenLoki]

Then friends/alts of the wanted person will immediately claim the bounty, without any fight.

Automatic bounty does not work in game without severe death penalties.

 

[TheEmperor1237]

I agree with the idea that putting bounties on "players" may not be as efficient as putting them on "ships". As mentioned above, bounty hunting is unfortunately a system that is extremely easy to game and exploit. You also run into the issue that players of obscene wealth can just start throwing out bags of money to change the entire landscape of the game of just to troll. For any reference of this, look at any of Eve's many large scale wars. The thing that might be different is putting bounties on factions. In essence, you become a privateer, you are being paid to destroy another factions ships for monetary gain. This I see being far more valuable and fun in terms of game design and player interaction.

 

[PopeUrban]

I agree with the idea that putting bounties on "players" may not be as efficient as putting them on "ships". As mentioned above, bounty hunting is unfortunately a system that is extremely easy to game and exploit. You also run into the issue that players of obscene wealth can just start throwing out bags of money to change the entire landscape of the game of just to troll. For any reference of this, look at any of Eve's many large scale wars. The thing that might be different is putting bounties on factions. In essence, you become a privateer, you are being paid to destroy another factions ships for monetary gain. This I see being far more valuable and fun in terms of game design and player interaction.

As an automated system this has the same problem. All you need is an alt to exploit the entire system.

The value for killing a ship should simply be intrinsic to the underlying design. Ships are made of materials and carry cargo, or ships are a threat to your allies.

There's no automated system that can really sidestep this issue. Any form of bounty or mercenary agreements really only work when players are in total control of the system and can police fraud.

Not to mention the entire concept of mercenaries in a sandbox is, classically, a failure. In general anyone that can afford to hire mercenaries can simply hire more permanent pilots for cheaper. This is why mercenaries in a pvp sandbox are rare, as a combination of extremely low demand for the services combined with the prohibitive cost of carrying out said tasks. In general the only people doing that work are doing so for the roleplaying aspects of it and even then are almost always spending a minority of their time actually working on contract. In a world where anyone can easily pick up a gun (or spaceship) and death is a minor incovenience the factors that create a market for PMCs in real life don't exist.

MMOs are basically a space where there are an unlimited number of legal child soldiers that never die. If you're wealthy enough to do it, there's no incentive to pay costly professionals for limited work when you can just hire new people or those disaffected with their current organization for free and pay them in essentially nothing but good vibes and covering their expenses while they make their own profit from the arrangement.

 

[Mule]

When it comes to MMOs...

 

[TheEmperor1237]

When it comes to MMOs...

I think regardless of anyone's opinions here, they can all agree on this.

 

[TheMarksman]

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1s1XKDdi2MjFQPCX4M9gXW6As4sPVEKma1rfQsnc5eNE/edit?usp=sharing
As the job doc would say, odds are against you.

 

[PopeUrban]

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1s1XKDdi2MjFQPCX4M9gXW6As4sPVEKma1rfQsnc5eNE/edit?usp=sharing
As the job doc would say, odds are against you.

What is the point of this document?

 

[TheMarksman]

Jobs that would work/can't work in SB?

What is the point of this document?

 

[PopeUrban]

Jobs that would work/can't work in SB?

I understand that. I don't understand the point of creating a document that's literally just a bunch of random people's random takes, and literally zero of them have ever played the game. None of these are authoritative statements by anyone important. They're just the same uninfomed assumptions and opinions as threads like this one, with less context.

I don't understand why you would do it.

If it were like a collection of developer quotes or something it would make sense, but this... I fail to see how it is in any way useful. I doubly fail to understand why you'd link it in a forum thread like it was an authoritative source.

Break it down for me man. What's the use case for this document? WHY did you make it, not WHAT is the content.

 

[TheMarksman]

I understand that. I don't understand the point of creating a document that's literally just a bunch of random people's random takes, and literally zero of them have ever played the game. None of these are authoritative statements by anyone important. They're just the same uninfomed assumptions and opinions as threads like this one, with less context.

I don't understand why you would do it.

If it were like a collection of developer quotes or something it would make sense, but this... I fail to see how it is in any way useful. I doubly fail to understand why you'd link it in a forum thread like it was an authoritative source.

Break it down for me man. What's the use case for this document? WHY did you make it, not WHAT is the content.

Sure, none of us would've played the game. However, we had the ability to make use of whatever information we've received from the devs to make our assumptions of the job itself. You're free to discount it as completely useless.

As for why it was made, it was simply because there was too many people asking whether job abc works in the discord.
Might as well compile them together.