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Corruption system exploits
Diamaht
Member, Braver of Worlds, Alpha One
I love the idea of open world pvp with a corruption system. My question is are there plans to combat the obvious work arounds? For example if death reduces corruption, couldn't I just grief then have a buddy on an alt kill me to collect the bounty then grief some more? That is basically what happened in EVE when bounties got high enough.
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Or if there are no monetary bounties, couldn't I at least get rid of corruption that way?
If a friend kills you to remove corruption, you may get around the item loss aspect of the penalty - but you are now faced with the experience portion of the penalty.
Also, when a corrupt player dies, they do not revive in pre-set areas, they revive at a random location somewhat near by. This means that if you gain more corruption than is able to be taken off with one kill, you are then in a position where your friend needs to find you before other players do - which is obviously still a risky place to be.
EVE provides another good example in the corporation C.O.D.E. They often don't care about profit, it's more about filling the tear buckets.
If corruption is limited to the character and not the account or at least all characters on a given server, and the use of a gank alt can provide ANY sort of advantage then it will definitely be used. Most games don't offer pvp exp, easy removal of corruption or crime mechanics is what causes friend farms.
IMHO it basically comes down to how much non consensual pvp they want in their game. If they want a lot of it then make it fast and easy to remove corruption, if they want very little of it then make it cumbersome and time consuming to remove corruption. The slider is then adjusted to get the desired result.
In most games, it is easy to maintain an alt like this, as you can simply send what ever they need for support from your main, and all is well.
In Ashes, you can't post items or coin. In order to get an item to a different character, you have to take the item to that character.
This has a few implications for gank alts.
The first is that it means the only two ways to get an item to them is to use another player to pass items between two characters, or to use in house storage. Both of these will be able to be tracked if players really want to.
The next major issue is that due to needing to physically hand these items to the alt, the alt won't want to travel too far from where the main has set up their base. The implication here is that the alt will be attacking players that are either directly or indirectly supporting the main - as all players in a node cluster will essentially be all working to keep that node cluster strong.
Not many node leaders will be happy if one of their citizens was found running a gank alt in the area, and chances are, guild leaders won't be super happy about it either.
On the other hand, if a player does use a gank alt on the other side of the map from their main, then more power to them imo. They are putting in the time.
The smart griefers will learn that it will be Node Sieges which will cause the most tears. Imagine the rush of adrenaline one would receive when you've just flattened someone's whole house?
edit: I have no pity for the ones who think ganking will be of any use. I'll love to hunt them as a Bounty Hunter.
AS A GREEN:
if you attack a green and
- green doesnt fight back and you kill them: you become RED (UP TO 4.0x death pentalites) they stay green (1.0x death penalties)
- green flags also and fights back: you BOTH become purple (0.5x death pentalties)
AS A PURPLE:
if you attack a green and
- green doesnt fight back and you kill them: you become RED (UP TO 4.0x death pentalites) they stay green (1.0x death penalties)
- green flags also and fights back: you BOTH become purple (0.5x death pentalties)
the ONLY way someone will become RED, is if they're killing players that DO NOT fight back. However, not fighting back will worse EVEN IF YOU DIE, from a death punishment perspective.
furthmore, if you WIN the fight, you get loot and bonuses from the purple name.
in respect to ashes, GANKING will prodominantly be PURPLE vs PURPLE simply because there is no reason to be GREEN or RED!
and the few reds that pop up, indeed we have an entire system to hunt them like dogs.
regarding tear collectors, only people that don't fight back will cry, not because they were killed, but because they lost lots of crafting materials and gave the cheeky PK'er some coin!
It is unlikely a lower level player will have much to take from the corpse. Furthermore, experience debt can be worked off. The corrupted player will then be hunted by Bounty Hunters, and, if the corrupted player sticks around could even be killed by the lower player due to the combat penalties. All in all the system will be more robust than calling all open-world PvP 'Ganking'.
also note, if players have buddies killing them, they're fair game for ANY combatant also. you see a guy helping his red buddy out? farm him too. PROFIT!
So, yes death reduces corruption, and you certainly can work around having your corruption by having your buddy kill you. If you happened to drop gear, your buddy could scoop that loot for you.
However, this does nothing to dampen the 300% - 400% negative expereince debt you'll accumulate for being corrupted. Nothing ever changes that.
So while you are circumventing a small part of the system, you are still going to be paying your dues
https://www.ashes101.com/pvp#corruption
so really killing a guy that doesn't flag gives you as the killer more loot.
furthermore, depending on level diff, which given that gathering and LOADS of other content types all give level exp to your character, will not be that large for the most part, you gain more corruption.
so if 2 equal level players are in the scenario, then the killer won't INSTANTLY turn red.
though the system is a bit deeper than that.
sadly our community Wiki is down else i'd link the page but check
https://ashesofcreation.wiki/
and search for corruption when it's back up!
Gear needs to be repaired. If while corrupted you gear loses more durability then as a combatant, then you aren't really saving much.
You need to recover
- XP debt
- gear repairs
- travel back to your corpse or current location
The only issue I could find is if a Bounty Hunter is friend with the corrupted and once it's flag, it kill the corrupted player for status in the Bounty Hunter System.
Yeah, the corrupted it's still losing stuff, but I can imagine certain people paying to get status in Bounty System.
For example mas level player with crap gear killing lowbies to get red and have Bounty Hunter friend kill such player to get the Bounty.
I mean, you still need to work the Exp debt, so there's it that.
though i cannot comment with 100% accuracy, the things mentioned about the monitoring system behind the game would perhaps pick this kind of behaviour up and restrict the bounty hunter. Furthermore, corruption doesn't get wiped on each death, it removes a set amount per death. and on respawn, red players are randomly spawned around the area. it isn't certain that your friend will be the hunter you walk into each time!
espceially if you've got a hefty bounty!
Indeed, which makes it great!
And let's be honest, if you're high level enough why wouldn't you fight back? If I'm farming ore and I get ganked, I HAVE to fight back. That's the difference between losing 50 ore against only losing 25. Unless I get one shot, it's in my best interest to fight back.
Because if you fight back the entire system breaks due to him not getting corruption. That is the issue with the system. It only works if you don’t fight back and take double penalty for not fighting back
It doesn't break, it WORKS!
Risk
Vs
Reward
Do you want to avoid PvP? Well, you can get killed. Player becomes red, but you lose more raw resources.
Do you fight back? You lose less resources IF and ONLY IF you die. You could kill the enemy.
Some players will collect resources all the time but some players are like me and have dedicated times of day when I will resource gather. Rest of the time I PvE and PvP.
how does it break? the system EXISTS to INCENTIVISE you to fight back. you dont get additional punishment for not fighting back and dying. you get LESS for fighting back and dying.
why is it so important that people are given red names?
if you're SO weak that you don't stand a chance in fighting back then the player WILL go red because that is implemented. if you just don't flag to try get the guy red in general, chances are he won't. Assuming you're roughly equal as characters. it makes absolutely NO sense for anyone to NOT fight back, even if they lose.
if you do not, you've ACTIVELY DODGED reduced item drops and exp debt.
like what? XD
And what prevents a player from taking off their gear and dying 10 times in a row to get rid of corruption?
I feel like it can be very easily exploited unless I'm missing something.
If you kill enough players, your going to become PVP ineffective. At some point before this, you will be hunted by bounty hunters (players) that can see you marked on the map. The way to reduce corruption is by dying to lose some corruption or grinding mobs to earn experience. Dying causes experience debt that cannot reduce your character level, but the experience debt must be paid before corruption can be cleared and level progression can continue.
I think that the real problem is becoming weaker to the point of being combat ineffective. The anti-pk system is designed to allow fighting anyone but discourage griefing. Becoming combat ineffective sounds like it will destroy long term griefing.
As described in the above posts, it looks like it will be difficult or impossible to avoid the grind mechanic required to return your character to combat effective so that you can continue griefing.
IMO, if you are combat ineffective and being hunted by bounty hunters that can see you on the world map while trying to spend many hours grinding to recover from corruption, it sounds like your going to have a bad time.
Bounty hunter is a progression system, not just a title or toggle.
If you want to progress as a bounty hunter and gain access to its rewards, you need to kill corrupt players as a bounty hunter.
I may be incorrect here, but I believe players with corruption are unable to remove or replace equipment.
TBH I'm not sure we have a consensus on what IS a negative.