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View Full Version : The New, Improved, Soul-Light System - READ ME DAMNIT!



Maloch Octavia
13-06-04, 23:56
Right, I made this in another thread, and several replies later, no bugger commented on it.

IT FUCKING WORKS!

Vote Good idea or bad idea, state why, comment, PLEASE!
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Change Faction Sympathy to Faction Loyalty, it better explains what it means.
Faction Loyalty (From hereon in- FL) works on a scale of Minus 100 to Plus 100.

-100 Means that Faction despises you, you're marked as Wanted on their Bounty Boards, and you stand very, very little chance of ever getting back into that Faction.

Zero means you are either a new Runner to the Faction, or that you are on Neutral standing with the Faction, they neither love you nor hate you.

+100 Means that Faction loves you to bits, you're honoured as one of their best. Benefits include maybe cheaper prices on Faction related products, and a harsher punishment for anyone that might attack the Factions beloved Runner.

At Zero point, if you sink into the Minus, you are immediately kicked out of the Faction. You recieve an email at your term, stating you are no longer welcome within the Faction, and that if you wish to appeal, contact the HR Manager. (Depending on your Minus level, he will give you various difficult Missions to do, that regain your FL)

Now, the mechanics..

If you are +100, and you kill someone in the same Faction, if they are in one of a set of fields, 0-10, 11-20, 21-30, and so on, you will take an FL hit.
Lets say that for the first level, you'll take -11, then the second, -22, so for every level, you'll take a further eleven points. So that if a +100 player, kills a +100 player, they will lose 110 points, and get kicked out of the Faction.

Now, when you get kicked out of the Faction, you are Barred from reapplying to join, for a set period of time.
If you are -10, it's one week, -20, two weeks, and beyond -50, you cannot reapply, until you are above -50. So the countdown to be able to even ask to rejoin, doesn't start until you're above -50. What this means, if you're -10, you've got one week to work it up to zero, before you can rejoin the Faction.

When you reapply, you get set Missions, as I stated, depending on your level, and you then have to work up. These are not Aggie Missions, or Cyclops Missions, these are complicated, lengthy Missions. Lots of running around, not so much on the killing. You've pissed off the Faction, they're going to use you as their work monkey for the low stuff. No fun Pk'ing here.

Now, if you just lose points, and you are still in the Plus, you can work back up by again doing Missions, but maybe these could be your normal Term Missions, maybe something a bit more challenging.

They are designed in levels too, so you need 'X' FL to apply for them, and for FL 90+, they become stupidly difficult, and give you only one or two points. Make it a challenge to reach the top, for reasons I'll mention later.

You now have a functioning Faction Loyalty system.

This in turn, is backed up by a Faction Reputation. The Reputation is a purely 'Faction side' score, and doesn't really come into play. It basically logs how many Faction Runners you have killed, that belong to that Faction, or an Allied Faction, and quite simply, when you hit a set number, you get kicked out too.
So if you are +100, and you kill lots of First Level people, losing 11 points, building up, rinsing and repeating, your kill tally at the Faction office will be climbing, and eventually you'll be kicked.

This prevents people from abusing the system. You can only go so far before you are punished for your crimes, no matter how hard you try to cover them up.

That is the one big abuse closed off.

Now, from reading above, you can see how people within your own Faction will be punished, if they kill each other, and what they risk by doing so.

As for people from Neutral Factions, attacking Neutral Factions, if you attack people that are in levels one to five, as in, no higher than +50 FL, then you get small rewards to your own FL points, nothing much.
However, if a Neutral Faction Runner kills another Neutral Faction Runner from a different Faction, that is above +50, then they will lose FL from their own Faction.

Why? Well, you're bringing undue notice now, to the Factions, and risk the Neutral basis upon which they operate. Your Faction doesn't mind you bumping off low FL Runners from other Neutral Factions, but when it gets to the high FL Runners, that Faction starts taking notice, and contacts your Faction complaining.

Now, if two Hostile Factions attack each other, then for Level one to five, you'll gain maybe five points per kill, to your own FL, but if you kill someone of say, FL 100, then you'll get maybe thirty or so points. A good way to climb up the ladder.

You will also gain points for a Neutral or Hostile kill, depending on how their Minus FL is to your Faction. So you can't have a high score within your own Faction, and keep everyone elses at zero, just to prevent people getting kill points.

So there you have a Rewards and Punishment system, using Faction Loyalty, and how it interacts. With little room for abuse.

As for Soullight, it could be theoretically removed, with Faction Guards, Bots, and NPC's reacting to your Faction Loyalty instead. IE: Faction Guards wont let you in if you have crap FL, you might not get into the City if you've crap FL with Cityadmin, etcetc.

Now for those that are kicked out of their Faction, they now have choices.

You have two other groups you can join.

One is the Outlaws, and they are the nasty, nasty people, that are Hostile to everyone, and have no punishments for killing anyone.
However, these people have no access to Neocron nor Dome of York, neither side want criminals in their cities. They also have no access to TechHaven or Military Base, same applies here.

They might be allowed to get into certain parts of TG Canyon, but that's up for debate.

These people essentially have to live in the Wastelands, the only storage space they'll have will be their GoGo's, and there will be bonuses for killing these people, but on limited numbers.

These will essentially be the Bounty Board people. If someone goes Outlaw, they get listed, you kill them, you get 20k, and the chance to hack their belt, as well as FL Bonuses for their Minus level to your Faction.

They will be permanently hunted, but their fun will be in being able to kill anyone.
That way the CityAdmin with their Copbot Runner armour finally have a job, and can patrol the Wastelands!

The other Group will be the Nomads, and these Runners simply aren't interested in the rat-race anymore. They are Neutral to everyone.
These people cannot enter Neocron or Dome of York, but have full access to the secondary bases, Military Base, TechHaven and TG Canyon. These are considered the Traders of the world, and will be treated as such. To kill these people, you recieve no bonuses, no benefits, nothing. You will however, have their deaths added to your Faction Reputation, and this will work towards you being booted out of your Faction. Your Faction doesn't appreciate you killing harmless Traders. (Unless of course you're an Outlaw)

If the Nomad Runner tries to kill however, he'll find himself kicked out of the Nomads in short order. They don't want their harmless reputation ruined.
Then it's only the Outlaws, or whatever Faction they have FL with and can join.

I think... I think that's everything......

It seems complicated on paper, but this is more or less ideal, and gives everyone the chance to do what they want.

*Breathes deeply*

Maarten
14-06-04, 00:16
Nice idea, but one exploit popped into my head when I was reading this. You said you can gain a lot of FL for killed a hostile runner that has a high FL. If you GR kill this person, your own FL will go through the roof and hit 100 with no effort at all.

Maybe the FL gain from killing hostiles/neutrals should stop when you reach 50 FL. To get 100 FL missions are the only way.

And I like the idea of having certain services not longer available when you hit a negative FL. For example, a negative FL with NEXT will remove your ability to use the Subway. Although also removing use of the GenRep system would be a bit extreme.

I can already see some nomad traders sneeking into the city through the secret entrances to sell some stuff in pepper park... :)

But you should get a little punishement for killing a nomad trader. Otherwise everyone can hunt them and they can't shoot back because they will be booted if they do.

Gohei
14-06-04, 00:17
I keep thinking about how easy it is to kill someone by accident. But i really do hate the SL, faction system as it is atm, and lame pricks who keep killing faction allies or runners of the same faction.

I'd rather see a solution to the accidental kills, as the a runner gets same punishment for that as a runner who does it on purpose.

Maloch Octavia
14-06-04, 00:38
You will however, have their deaths added to your Faction Reputation, and this will work towards you being booted out of your Faction.

There's your punishment for killing Nomad Traders. Your unreversable Faction Reputation.

Okay, to prevent the GR exploit, you introduce a system whereby you only get FL bonuses for killing a Hostile Runner, once, during a set time period. The same Runner that is. So you can't GR kill Hostiles, as after the first kill, you'll get no Bonuses.

Or else put a daily limit on Bonuses, to prevent people going crazy. Only say the first five or ten deaths get you bonuses, and you can only have one of those in level five, two in level four, so on, so forth.

So you can't have all five or ten deaths as ten seperate level five guys with high FL, you only get it for one of them, so your Bonuses drop lower and lower, making it less and less worthwhile.

All that means, is if you keep killing, you don't get your bonuses, but aren't punished (Circumstances depending).

Jailbird
14-06-04, 02:24
Great Idea, adds more depth to neocron.


Now for those that are kicked out of their Faction, they now have choices.

You have two other groups you can join.


but cant you maybe join a hostile faction if you are kicked from ur faction instead of choosing to join the Traders or Outlaws?

Maloch Octavia
14-06-04, 02:31
If you read it, it says that to join a Faction, you need to have a certain FL with them, I just didn't state that at that point, I see I should have.

So when you get kicked from your Faction, you can apply to join any Faction you have the correct FL with, as well as Outlaws or Nomads.

Sorry. :)

Jailbird
14-06-04, 02:35
If you read it, it says that to join a Faction, you need to have a certain FL with them, I just didn't state that at that point, I see I should have.

So when you get kicked from your Faction, you can apply to join any Faction you have the correct FL with, as well as Outlaws or Nomads.

Sorry. :)

heh, i need some sleep then

Heavyporker
14-06-04, 03:08
While its a nice idea, its in regards to the faction sympathy system, not soullight.


And I think soullight MUST be separate from the faction system.

Soullight should be a measure of your lawfulness as regards to behaving inside the City.

maybe pulling out/leaving out your weapon in front of a CA officer or copbot loses you a couple points (in addition with the copbot frying you after warnings), so continually forgetting to holster puts you on the outs with CA/NCPD.

Could also put in drug penalities - if a copbot or CA officer sees you intoxicated on the streets, thats more points lost, public disorderliness or something.

Oh, and killing a pro-city faction runner puts your SL down too, so even if you somewhat make it up to that faction, you're still in bad standing in front of CA/NCPD, because they don't care about faction standings, you disobeyed the LAWS!

Xaru
14-06-04, 08:59
And I think soullight MUST be separate from the faction system.
Soullight should be a measure of your lawfulness as regards to behaving inside the City.
maybe pulling out/leaving out your weapon in front of a CA officer or copbot loses you a couple points (in addition with the copbot frying you after warnings), so continually forgetting to holster puts you on the outs with CA/NCPD.

No, kick the SL, because its only the representation of City Laws. Other Faction might have other laws. So the FL should represent that. Make CopBots CA then, and everything will work out fine.

One idea i had for this. Give every faction a police office, where you can report offences or murder done to you within a certain period of time. depending on your FL and Their FL they use different trust levels. If enough people reported a runner and they where trustworthy enough, the runners get on the faction bounty list. If you turn in thier dog tag, you get a reward, they get removed from the list again. :) this would make PK more fun and reasonable.

Regards
Xaru

Heavyporker
14-06-04, 09:12
factions with their own laws? what idiocy.

All the pro-city factions are completely subordinate to CityAdmin/NCPD. They OWN the fucking city. They have the fucking city LOCKED DOWN. Their law is everyone's law.

You don't like those laws? Tough. Get out of the City then.

Tank!
14-06-04, 09:46
I agree with most of the suggested changes, however the soul light system is fine as it is thanks to the changes made to the LE itself. Considering Neocron is a PvP'ers wet-dream, you have to leave the possibility open for a players choice to participate in that part of the game but not punishing them for that descision. One thing I would like fixed is the accidental SL hit bug that occurs during battle if you accidentally hit someone with say an AOE weapon (RGC/Barrel/etc) and they die, there is that large chance you getting majorly screwed in the SL department. Though it is one of the hardest bugs to squash in the game, addressing that one first before considering any changes to the SL system

The FL system you describe is pretty elaborate, but the current loyalty system with factions is *ok* for now. Maybe try suggesting something that will elaborate and maybe enhance the current system by bringing out its importance? By that I mean adding new features to show how important it really is to be loyal to your faction. What about a way for players to get so wrapt in their faction that they cannot leave? The higher up you go, the more private information about the faction is revealed and it becomes harder for you to leave because of what you know. THAT alone would be cool to have as an added role-play feature to really enhance the users experience in the game. Those epic runs should mean a lot more than just some rare at the end and the runs themselves should bear a signifcant weight on your loyalty to the faction and what it stands for in its entirety.

Keep up the good work with ideas, lets just hope these can get pushed into the expansion as it will dramatically increase the games enjoyability which will help with the (sadly) dropping player population.

Xaru
14-06-04, 13:38
factions with their own laws? what idiocy.

All the pro-city factions are completely subordinate to CityAdmin/NCPD. They OWN the fucking city. They have the fucking city LOCKED DOWN. Their law is everyone's law.

You don't like those laws? Tough. Get out of the City then.
Which City do you mean? Neocron or Dome of York? so i guess its more pro cityadmin laws and anti cityadmin laws. But i hope you get the picture.

Xaru

Maloch Octavia
14-06-04, 13:40
We live in a post apocalyptic world.
Law means very little.
Look at CityAdmin! They only just manage to control the main sections of their City, yet we still get raided by DoY?

Ditch the Soul-light, it's useless and means nothing anymore.
The only accountable law should be that of your Faction, CA Copbots are there only to secure the main city areas.

Ditch the Soul-Light, bring in Faction Loyalty!

Agent FunHead
30-06-04, 19:17
One quick question, maybe you already said and i missed it but how on earth is this gonna work with clans?

greendonkeyuk
30-06-04, 19:55
love it. reset my 0 for all and 50 for my own faction, do that with all my chars (and everyone elses) and im down. 5 stars.

Opar
30-06-04, 20:02
Sexy. I want.

Mr_Snow
30-06-04, 20:10
Fairly good system but no system will really work until KK finds a way to sort out who is the aggressor in any given fight, just say a 100 faction symp runner starts a fight with another 100 runner, presuming they are both in the samefaction, but dies so the other guy gets the penalty which would be being kicked out of his said faction for his trouble which is very harsh for just defending yourself.

amfest
30-06-04, 21:18
Pretty Nice and well organized post. But you're gonna have to wait and see how the soul light and faction stuff was changed for BDOY cause I believe it has been revamped. I could be wrong as I got up not too long ago and can't see very clearly, head groggy. Oh well . . .

Judge
30-06-04, 21:22
I agree with amfest and Mr_Snow. Sounds good, but wait until after DoY, and also get a system to find out who attacked who. Otherwise you'll get people attacking members of the faction they don't like, and then losing on purpose (I mean, what is a few pokes?) to get them either kicked out or lose loads of FL.

jernau
30-06-04, 22:18
FS (or FL) should be character-based only. Being TT should make it hard to get "green" to FA but not impossible for instance.

The fixed faction relations should only apply modifiers to things that alter them (eg missions for "enemy" factions give less sympathy). This one change alone would improve the game a-hundred-fold IMO.

{MD}GeistDamnit
30-06-04, 22:21
Should have put an option for "I like but needs work/tweaking.

I like the idea, but there are some things about it that could use tweaks. Like the +30 for killing a red with +100 FL. And the gains in general.

brackk
30-06-04, 22:46
Fairly good system but no system will really work until KK finds a way to sort out who is the aggressor in any given fight, just say a 100 faction symp runner starts a fight with another 100 runner, presuming they are both in the samefaction, but dies so the other guy gets the penalty which would be being kicked out of his said faction for his trouble which is very harsh for just defending yourself.

Factions in this system would NOT want a runner of theirs to shoot back even in "defence". The aggressor would be punished via the system when the victim died. A system like this would be interesting because you would have to identify a person before shooting back.

The most interesting thing about this proposal is that it would force people to look and think before they blast away.

Mr_Snow
30-06-04, 23:22
Factions in this system would NOT want a runner of theirs to shoot back even in "defence". The aggressor would be punished via the system when the victim died. A system like this would be interesting because you would have to identify a person before shooting back.

In that case screw what factions want, I dont die without a fight unless Im afk and never will.

Maloch Octavia
30-06-04, 23:24
but dies so the other guy gets the penalty which would be being kicked out of his said faction for his trouble which is very harsh for just defending yourself.

Sounds crazy, but, don't attack back, or don't kill at least.

Seriously, you'll never be able to define who started it, not within game parameters anyway.
Unless

You use something like:

Runner X Health = 100
Runner Y Damages Runner X and removes 'x' % of 100 health
Runner Y is now marked as Immediate Threat
Runner X can now kill Runner 'Y' without suffering any punishments?

If the system can decide who did the most damage on a mob, it should be feasible to decide who does most damage to a person, and mark them as Immediate Threat, and remove punishments for killing.

Thus self-defence is now implemented.

As for gang-gankings, well, just take the beating or risk it. At the end of the day, they'll all be punished for your death, instead of just you for killing one of them.

As for Clans, it'll work with Clans, in that, once they declare War, you can go by a new set of systems, where that Clan operates under Hostile settings.

The figures were just examples for the benefit of my explanation, they can all be tweaked.

Mr_Snow
30-06-04, 23:27
If you cant define who started a fight then such a harsh system as the one you propose just isnt viable.

Maloch Octavia
30-06-04, 23:32
I don't think you'll ever be able to do that though, show me one game where it has happened?

Stray gunfire would immediately mark you as viable, because you fired the first inadvertent shot.

So % of damage caused would be the best bet.

You can't have everything in this imperfect world. Personally, if I was 100+ and someone from my Faction who was 100+ tried to kill me, I'd let them, because the punishment is so strong.

This is trying to emphasise...

Don't attack your Faction Runners!!

So I'm not going to look at ways of working around that. If someone is 100+ and attacks a fellow Faction Runner at 100+, good fucking luck to them, because that's hours of work going down the swanney.

Spikadelia
01-07-04, 00:32
Swift reply. Late night and early start is my excuse for not responding in depth.

Good work Maloch. Hope this gets read by plenty of the knowledgable heads in the community. Particularly like the outlaw/nomad options you propose.

;)

Mr_Snow
01-07-04, 00:38
I don't think you'll ever be able to do that though, show me one game where it has happened?

Stray gunfire would immediately mark you as viable, because you fired the first inadvertent shot.

So % of damage caused would be the best bet.

You can't have everything in this imperfect world. Personally, if I was 100+ and someone from my Faction who was 100+ tried to kill me, I'd let them, because the punishment is so strong.

This is trying to emphasise...

Don't attack your Faction Runners!!

So I'm not going to look at ways of working around that. If someone is 100+ and attacks a fellow Faction Runner at 100+, good fucking luck to them, because that's hours of work going down the swanney.

EVE has a fairly good agressions system which they are currently improving but yes there is always the fact of stray fire being seen by the AI as an attack but personally I would rather then not being able to defend myself when attacked.

The fact that anyone ever is willing to let themselves be killed just goes to show that the punishments for dying are too low in the game.

Ive currently go 100 protopharm sympathy on 2 characters, neither are protopharm and I havent done missions on either in months so it doesnt nessarily take hours of work to get your faction symp that high all you have to do is gank a mule for a bit which will actually be easier with your system.

Epsilon 5
01-07-04, 00:42
I don't think you'll ever be able to do that though, show me one game where it has happened?

Lineage 2

Maloch Octavia
01-07-04, 17:35
Ive currently go 100 protopharm sympathy on 2 characters, neither are protopharm and I havent done missions on either in months so it doesnt nessarily take hours of work to get your faction symp that high all you have to do is gank a mule for a bit which will actually be easier with your system.

You're comparing it to the current system. The proposal I've made, has nothing to do with the current setup, or how easy it is.

If you decide to gank a mule, you'll get minimal returns for it, unless he's exceptionally high level in Faction Loyalty.


Now, if two Hostile Factions attack each other, then for Level one to five, you'll gain maybe five points per kill, to your own FL, but if you kill someone of say, FL 100, then you'll get maybe thirty or so points. A good way to climb up the ladder.

Okay, so lets create figures. To avoid ganking, you simply work it, that you get one point for every Hostile kill you make, or maybe even less, maybe have it for every kill you make, you only get 0.1 Faction Loyalty. Why? Because the world isn't all about killing, thus closing off the Gank abuse. There are other ways to gain your Faction Loyalty up. Put forward suggestions, don't just compare to the current imperfect system.

It would be much harder to climb up via Missions, as I stated. The higher your FL, the harder the Missions become, and the less points you get for them.

So if you're FL 90, then to get to FL 100, you might have to do fifty mission which only give you 0.5pts each, or something like that.


The fact that anyone ever is willing to let themselves be killed just goes to show that the punishments for dying are too low in the game.

Okay, so here's a new addition.
If you're killed by a Runner in your Faction, or an Allied Faction, then your belt becomes unhackable. The Runner needs to commit 'x' amount of damage though, thus meaning being ganked alone by an allied Faction Runner, isn't going to happen, they'd need to go about in a group of mixed Factions.

I can't see any abuses with that, can anyone else?

Mr_Snow
01-07-04, 17:56
You only get minimal returns for ganking a mule with the current system when sympathy gets high you can be lucky to get 1 sympathy for 10 kills but you have to take into account that you can kill a mule as fast as he can come out of a GR which is pretty damn fast.

You also presume that people kill to hack your belt which isnt always the case, generally if your going to kill an allied or especially a faction runner its because you dont like them personally and therefore if you do get anything from a belt its a bonus.

Dont be taking what I say as a rubbishing of your system because Im not, it would help promote roleplay in the game and replace the current flawed system all Im saying is that it has to be introduced with a working aggression system for it to work properly.

Maloch Octavia
01-07-04, 19:22
You also presume that people kill to hack your belt which isnt always the case, generally if your going to kill an allied or especially a faction runner its because you dont like them personally and therefore if you do get anything from a belt its a bonus.

No, by making the belt unhackable, it gives you more of a reason not to attack back if you're being attacked by an Allied or Same-Faction Runner.
This is about the player under attack, realising that the penalties the attacker will recieve for killing you, far outweighs, the benefits of defending yourself.

It's not perfect, but the current system is hellish in comparison.

-FN-
01-07-04, 19:30
/me likes... very in-depth and at first glance, well thought out.

I'd dig a system like that.

*****