Mule PKing

On yesterday's stream we learned that killing a player's controlled creature will give us lesser corruption value than what we would've gotten if we killed the player themselves.

Here's the clip for context
https://clips.twitch.tv/SteamyLivelyWaterMau5-VRVyw0WmCXdCvPoZ

And with that in mind I started to ask myself, why would that be the case, considering that the mule can carry x10 of the player's inventory and will most likely get utilized during prolonged farming sessions (be it artisan or mob-based one) or just to "safely" transfer mats between locations, instead of using a caravan.

This seems quite counterproductive to the principle of "risk vs reward" in the context of the corruption system. You murder a mule, you get less corruption than what you would've gotten were you to kill the owner BUT THEN you get x10 more loot than what you would've gotten off of the owner. If that ain't wack I don't know what is.

Steven previously mentioned that you can knock a player off a mount with CCs. And we now know that you can't use CCs against green players. This would imply that a player who's transferring mats by riding the mule should be safe from those CCs.

But then there's a problem of

Mounts can be targeted separately from the player while mounted.[26]

I would assume that mule speed is rather low, otherwise the caravan system would not be used because it'd be easier to just make a few trips on a mule rather than risking a caravan. And with that speed being low, attacking a mule while not mounted should be pretty easy (especially for a ranged character). Which means that you can PK the mount directly, have your partymates completely loot it (potentially 5 players'-worth of stuff) and just run off into the sunset, while you have less corruption to work off than if you'd killed the rider.

What is yall's opinion on this? To me this seems assbackwards. There's a chance that we just don't know some detail that solves this issue or this will just get changed during testing, but what is your opinion on is as it currently stands? Do you want it to get changed or do you think it's fair to get less corruption for much greater rewards?

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Electronn

NiKr wrote: »

THEN you get x10 more loot than what you would've gotten off of the owner. If that ain't wack I don't know what is.

You know what this sounds like? Sounds like a job for a poison pill

Just messin with you. Good points raised in your post.

I think if someone is using a mule, they need to be prepared to defend it. If someone is going to let an attacker kill their mule uncontested, I'm okay with less corruption on the mule. For me, corruption is good to prevent player deaths, but shouldn't allow players to transport high value with no risk. Steven's comments made it sound like it will be untenable to kill a green, and I don't think a mule should be protected by this. The mule transport needs some amount of risk, otherwise some people may make 10 trips with a mule instead of using the more risky caravan system.

Plus, a player could always keep their most valuable gathererables in their personal bags, while the mule carries the common stuff. And if a gatherer is carrying something very valuable in their personal bags, that then creates a very interesting risk/reward decision on whether to defend the mule

Idk, initial thoughts, need to ponder it more.

Ludullu

mcnasty wrote: »

Idk, initial thoughts, need to ponder it more.

It's good points but they all mainly address the victim's side of the equation, while I was more concentrated on the attacker's one. Especially the Xvs1 situations.

Usually you'd either run away from a group of attackers or hang corruption on one of them in hopes of them getting punished (with fighting back only being a valid choice if you had smth valuable). But, assuming that you can't just get on another faster mount while you have a sully stocked mule, in this situation your only real solution is to fight back, because even basic mats in big amounts are quite valuable. And to me this sounds like just the super forced type of pvp that a lot of people dislike.

Imo, considering the potential rewards, you either shouldn't be able to attack a mule-type mount until you kill the owner or the mule itself could give scaled corruption values depending on its capacity. To me this seems like a fairer "risk vs reward" equation than the current "pay a little price to get a huge prize".

hzrdd

Is it 100% confirmed that when you PK a mount carrying Mats, that you get its whole purse? I was under the impression that it was only a fraction of the resources that was lootable. Same with players who are not corrupted also. Please correct me if I'm wrong and cite it for me. Thanks

Arya_Yeshe

Well, if we don't bring the actual info containing all aspects in one go then it will be hard putting together this puzzle.

I just hope that people be knocked out of their mules and we can opt by attacking the mule only, this seems good.

Killing the player will force a respawn somewhere else, but if he doesn't die then he can keep travelling.

This will let true elite pvpers making roadblocks and having a toll.

Strevi

NiKr wrote: »

What is yall's opinion on this? To me this seems assbackwards. There's a chance that we just don't know some detail that solves this issue or this will just get changed during testing, but what is your opinion on is as it currently stands? Do you want it to get changed or do you think it's fair to get less corruption for much greater rewards?

I think the mule is a design error because is in competition with the caravan mechanic which forces players to accept PvP.
But maybe the mule can still act as a compromise for when a caravan cannot be used.
Like transporting goods from the freehold to the caravanserai.
What definitely should be avoided is to provide a safe place to store materials while gathering rare resources a few hours long over the entire map.

However is consistent with what many players asked in the gathering and PvP thread: a place to store materials safely: that might be their own inventory.

Another info in the stream was the introduction of various crate sizes, even the extra large crates.
I wonder if those will store more materials or if are reserved for some special components, like siege weapons or ship components which should not be in my opinion fit onto a mule at all.

CROW3

Hm… I was a little puzzled by the % corruption as well. I would have thought it would be 1:1 - and that would be my preference - given the mule carries substantially more material (10:1).

As with everything corruption we‘ve pretty much talked it to death, and just need to test it.

wrms

I think you make a good point. I imagine the idea of mules being less corruption to kill was that it was seen as less disruptive to a player than getting PKed, but from this perspective it could actually be more disruptive. I didn't really have a problem with this before, but now that I think about it, you are right, this doesn't seem very in line with the risk vs reward that Steven just said they won't compromise on.

Xenotor

Strevi wrote: »

NiKr wrote: »

What is yall's opinion on this? To me this seems assbackwards. There's a chance that we just don't know some detail that solves this issue or this will just get changed during testing, but what is your opinion on is as it currently stands? Do you want it to get changed or do you think it's fair to get less corruption for much greater rewards?

I think the mule is a design error because is in competition with the caravan mechanic which forces players to accept PvP.
But maybe the mule can still act as a compromise for when a caravan cannot be used.
Like transporting goods from the freehold to the caravanserai.
What definitely should be avoided is to provide a safe place to store materials while gathering rare resources a few hours long over the entire map.

However is consistent with what many players asked in the gathering and PvP thread: a place to store materials safely: that might be their own inventory.

Another info in the stream was the introduction of various crate sizes, even the extra large crates.
I wonder if those will store more materials or if are reserved for some special components, like siege weapons or ship components which should not be in my opinion fit onto a mule at all.

From my understanding you fill your mule with stuff and bring it to the next node where a caravan can start off.
Repeat the process until you got a full caravan.
Then use the caravan to transport the mass of raw goods to your home node.

Also Steven said that he did not want people Pking for the sake of making them rage Quit.
But its ok to PK to steal others stuff.
Its a risk of the attacker having the possibility to get killed while being corrupted.
Loosing maybe even their own gear and taking a ton of exp debt.
While the target has the risk of being attacked while carrying goods.

I am more concerned how green players can abuse the mule.
Let Purple guy kill mule while you stay green.
Purple guy becomes Red.
Kill red guy while staying green.
If he kills you he gains even more corruption.

PM the bounty hunters in discord that there is a red in node X.
or call your friends to hunt the red down.
Profit by looting the gear from red.

As for the having 1 guy kill a mule and 4 others loot it.
Just make it so that anyone outside the guild / party / family of the mule owner cant loot the dead mule without gaining corruption for X minutes.
The loot bag should shine Red to make sure everyone understands that they gain corruption by looting it.

Ludullu

Xenotor wrote: »

As for the having 1 guy kill a mule and 4 others loot it.
Just make it so that anyone outside the guild / party / family of the mule owner cant loot the dead mule without gaining corruption for X minutes.
The loot bag should shine Red to make sure everyone understands that they gain corruption by looting it.

This would have to be a change to the bigger system

Non-combatants will not be flagged for looting bodies.[11]

https://ashesofcreation.wiki/Player_flagging

hzrdd wrote: »

Is it 100% confirmed that when you PK a mount carrying Mats, that you get its whole purse? I was under the impression that it was only a fraction of the resources that was lootable. Same with players who are not corrupted also. Please correct me if I'm wrong and cite it for me. Thanks

@hzrdd you get the same portion of its inventory that you would from the owner. So a green mule will drop X amount of stuff and a purple mule will drop X/2. And obviously a red one would drop 4X.

Strevi wrote: »

What definitely should be avoided is to provide a safe place to store materials while gathering rare resources a few hours long over the entire map.

Oh, for sure. I mainly just want a better "risk vs reward" equation for this interaction. Definitely don't want to overprotect transportation of goods.

Strevi

Xenotor wrote: »

I am more concerned how green players can abuse the mule.

If I see them doing things with the poor animal... I will call animal protection

Strevi

NiKr wrote: »

Strevi wrote: »

What definitely should be avoided is to provide a safe place to store materials while gathering rare resources a few hours long over the entire map.

Oh, for sure. I mainly just want a better "risk vs reward" equation for this interaction. Definitely don't want to overprotect transportation of goods.

I think nobody wins and all sides get a compromise.
Hard to predict in detail before we see the entire chain production, all ingredients involved in recipes and where those resources come from.
For example fish. Is it used only for food? Certain fish might come from mountain lakes only.
Some plants might spawn only in the arid or desert areas.
If Steven wants, can make them unique and non-replaceable by other kind of resources and one could not find them unless he lives in those nodes, close. Then I would introduce a decay time, to store the resource fast in containers to keep them fresh. Processing fresh resources could give an advantage.
Then processed goods should be shipped only with crates.

I hope Steven will protect the caravan system, because it is the only thing which sets the game apart from other MMOs.

Arya_Yeshe

wrms wrote: »

I think you make a good point. I imagine the idea of mules being less corruption to kill was that it was seen as less disruptive to a player than getting PKed, but from this perspective it could actually be more disruptive. I didn't really have a problem with this before, but now that I think about it, you are right, this doesn't seem very in line with the risk vs reward that Steven just said they won't compromise on.

I think player death is more disruptive because this could block you from reaching your destinations, people can literally deny content from you by making a roadblock, but if you don't die then it's fine you can keep going.

Voxtrium

Well, as someone above pointed out, if you kill my mule you will be corrupted, albiet only a little, but you are still corrupted with dampened stats, now I the defending player can kill you without becoming a combatant, take your resources as payment for my lost mule resources. (I am assuming a mule fully loaded will drop a portion of its mats but idk)

Importantly this means that regardless of level, as long as I am with the mule and you kill it, I can whale on you for free so either you die or respond, maybe kill me as well and end up with significantly more corruption.

Now problems that arise here is a mid level getting ganked by a high level where the defender will not win even with dampened stats. Now the question that is mainly raised is, was it not on the player to calculate the value of their goods and appropriately prepare themselves?

Another issue I would personally get real annoyed with, will be when I farm peacefully for 3 hours enjoying my evening talking to my buds and I have nothing but some standard stone/wood in my mules bags but someone sees the mule and kills it. If i immediately lose access to the full loot that was available in the mule while it was alive then regardless of if i win that fight I will have lost a potentially large amount of time. So hopefully IS decides that when a mule dies it drops 100% of its loot to be repicked up and not a reduced amount like in caravans.

All around, I think this will force players gathering high tier resources to be in small groups, encouraging group play, but also potentially creating guilds blocking resource locations more often because if you already need to group to safely harvest the materials why would you let another group do the same?

Completely unsure how I feel about this ngl. Like others stated mules cannot replace the caravans, however the potential for griefing is really high if mules drop a portion of loot and not all. If mules drop all loot they had, I think the system would be ok, my only worry being that playing this game alone will be nearly impossible if you are near any in game population centers or popular destinations.

Ludullu

Voxtrium wrote: »

Completely unsure how I feel about this ngl. Like others stated mules cannot replace the caravans, however the potential for griefing is really high if mules drop a portion of loot and not all. If mules drop all loot they had, I think the system would be ok, my only worry being that playing this game alone will be nearly impossible if you are near any in game population centers or popular destinations.

The mule drops the same portion as the player. And the loot is in the mule's corpse, so I'm assuming that if no one loots it - you can just resurrect the mule after some time and all the loot will be still in it (though I'm not sure if we know either way).

And as for the corrupted interaction, like I said in the post, the loot would be picked up by the PKer's mates rather than the PK himself, so while the PKer will still suffer the death penalties, the amount of loot garnered from that single kill should far outweigh that penalty, especially considering that one death would probably be enough due to lower amounts of corruption.

And as you said, this will push people to be way more social, but it would also provide quite a lot of tedium to any solo gatherer that might've wanted to have a good gathering session. And we don't even know the values of our inventory capacity. Maybe you can only cut down 20 trees before maxing out your backpack. This would mean that you either have to use a mule to gather more or run to the nearest storage every few minutes, which is beyond being a chore it'd just be bad design imo.

Arya_Yeshe

Voxtrium wrote: »

Well, as someone above pointed out, if you kill my mule you will be corrupted, albiet only a little, but you are still corrupted with dampened stats, now I the defending player can kill you without becoming a combatant, take your resources as payment for my lost mule resources. (I am assuming a mule fully loaded will drop a portion of its mats but idk)

Importantly this means that regardless of level, as long as I am with the mule and you kill it, I can whale on you for free so either you die or respond, maybe kill me as well and end up with significantly more corruption.

Now problems that arise here is a mid level getting ganked by a high level where the defender will not win even with dampened stats. Now the question that is mainly raised is, was it not on the player to calculate the value of their goods and appropriately prepare themselves?

Another issue I would personally get real annoyed with, will be when I farm peacefully for 3 hours enjoying my evening talking to my buds and I have nothing but some standard stone/wood in my mules bags but someone sees the mule and kills it. If i immediately lose access to the full loot that was available in the mule while it was alive then regardless of if i win that fight I will have lost a potentially large amount of time. So hopefully IS decides that when a mule dies it drops 100% of its loot to be repicked up and not a reduced amount like in caravans.

All around, I think this will force players gathering high tier resources to be in small groups, encouraging group play, but also potentially creating guilds blocking resource locations more often because if you already need to group to safely harvest the materials why would you let another group do the same?

Completely unsure how I feel about this ngl. Like others stated mules cannot replace the caravans, however the potential for griefing is really high if mules drop a portion of loot and not all. If mules drop all loot they had, I think the system would be ok, my only worry being that playing this game alone will be nearly impossible if you are near any in game population centers or popular destinations.

I don't think being robbed is a problem.

On the next night rally your buddies and go for a chill robbin the hood.

What people are failing is seeing that they can be in both ends in this tug of war, one day you will be stealing, the next day people will steal from you.

It's just the content, it's fine like this.

Voxtrium

Arya_Yeshe wrote: »

I don't think being robbed is a problem.

On the next night rally your buddies and go for a chill robbin the hood.

What people are failing is seeing that they can be in both ends in this tug of war, one day you will be stealing, the next day people will steal from you.

It's just the content, it's fine like this.

Even the most hardcore players don't want to be constantly fighting for their life or resources. There has been many a time when I have just wanted to sit back and enjoy the games aesthetics and grind insane amounts of loot, I know for a fact I will usually have a group, however when I'm not I don't want to be forced to different content because it is common for mules to be taken by other players.

@NiKr

And as for the corrupted interaction, like I said in the post, the loot would be picked up by the PKer's mates rather than the PK himself, so while the PKer will still suffer the death penalties, the amount of loot garnered from that single kill should far outweigh that penalty, especially considering that one death would probably be enough due to lower amounts of corruption

So it will likely depend on gathering speeds. If my inventory can hold 1000 items, and a mule 10,000 but it takes an hour to grind 1,000 gatherables then the mule will never be filled by a single players grind, or if it is, then that is a big risk that is accepted by the player, since asking a player to return to an inventory location once every 2-3 hours is very acceptable.

With that being the case, if I solo gather with a mule and your group of 3 gank me, you have no idea if I have been farming for 20 minutes or 120 minutes and thus the resource drop might very well be very mediocre. All in all I think as long as the player inventory is relatively good and and the gathering speed average then mule usage will often be used at a partial capacity merely to increase grinding time but almost never used to fully max out unless in a group, which would nullify your worry.

Ludullu

Voxtrium wrote: »

All in all I think as long as the player inventory is relatively good and and the gathering speed average then mule usage will often be used at a partial capacity merely to increase grinding time but almost never used to fully max out unless in a group, which would nullify your worry.

Not really though. As long as the mule holds even just a bit over the player's backpack capacity - I win out big time, because I get more resources than I would've gotten from the player himself, while also getting less corruption for doing so. And if the player fights back in hopes of avoid that loss - I stand to loot pretty much the same amount of resources as I would've from a green mule (well, that is if player's backpack is maxed and the mule has roughly the same amount of stuff).

My main worry here is more about the risk vs reward equation. Mules exist to carry more shit in them, yet they give you less corruption. I see that as the biggest PKing bait, while also being a huge detriment to any player who hasn't thought deeply about all of the consequences of having resources on his mule. And I feel like there's gonna be at quite a few of such people.

There's a chance that the "lower value of corruption" will be smth like 90 for the mule while it's 100 for the player, but at that point I just don't see why you'd have that distinction.

And just as a personal opinion, having a rule where you gotta kill the player before you can kill the mule would lead to a much more exhilarating risk-taking situation with a huge potential for reward. And this could then be a natural bait for PKing. You ride a super slow, but empty, mule instead of a fast mount in hope of fucking someone over with corruption. But the choice to go corrupt would be purely and truly just on the attacker, rather than have some other nefarious reason behind it, be it pve griefing or some other kind of player abuse to bait a PK.

That to me sounds like a great risk vs reward situation.

Craiken

I suspect they want people to be able to kill mules so that players are incentivized to use the caravan system.

Ludullu

Craiken wrote: »

I suspect they want people to be able to kill mules so that players are incentivized to use the caravan system.

While I get that sentiment, I'd definitely say that would be some bad design. Instead of proving a good reason to use a system, you're punishing players for not using it. And that's w/o even mentioning that caravan system is risky enough with it being a ffa pvp zone.

Why even have mules if they're there just to punish people into using caravans. It seems especially silly considering that there's already an example of an "encourage rather than punish" system in the game. That being the pvp system. You're encouraged to fight back and rewarded with lower death penalties in case you lose.

While here you have the caravan system, which is already risky, reinforced by the potential risks of your mule getting killed because it gives less corruption. And if you use neither of those systems, you have to spend a shitton of time to transfer your goods.

All while the punishments for the attackers are directly inverse. You lose pretty much nothing in a caravan attack (gear decay and potential loss of ladder progress is nothing compared to the potential rewards). You only gain a relatively small amount of corruption if you go directly for the mule, while getting up to x10 the player loot. And you get full corruption if you kill a player while only getting the smallest reward for it.

It's a weird inverse of risk system. Non-pvpers are encouraged to waste their time running around with only their backpack capacity to transfer goods, while pvpers are encouraged to attack the highest value targets. I didn't think about this interaction in-depth before, but now that I notice it, it is much much more lenient towards pvpers than I thought.

Voxtrium

@NiKr If you bring 3 people to gank 1 dudes mule, the players inventory takes 1 hour to fill up, the mule takes 10 hours. Assume the person has been putting all resources into the mule, but they only have grinded for 20 minutes, well if you kill mule and run away, congrats you've gotten 50% of 20% of a players worth of inventory and you used 3 people to do it. Math doesn't add up in your favor at all. Even if the defending player has grinded for 1 hour, thats 1 players inventory worth of goods on that mule, split among 3 players, still not worth it. Its not worth it till you have the defending player grinding an hour per attacking player.

With your strat it requires a minimum of 2 players, and therefore 2 hours of prior grinding by the defending player, and tbh, 2 hours of grinding means they should have dropped off their grinded resources by then... obviously this is based on a theory regarding gatherables and the time required to gather them.

And these timetables are based on if the player is putting 100% of grinded resources onto their mule, so imo this situation is highly dependent on the gather speed and player storage.

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