Idea for death penalty when low lvl players are ganked

There have been a number of threads discussing the problem with death penalty when a low level player has been ganked. The problem is, the deterrent for high levels ganking low levels is increased corruption; however, the ganker only receives increased corruption if the the low level does not fight back; and, not fighting back causes the low level to take double the death penalty compared to if the low level did fight back.

A related question is, why does a low level ganked player that did not choose to fight and has no chance of winning due to level difference have to suffer the full death penalty?

I have a solution to improve the experience of being a low level ganked player for both problems. I think that death penalty from PVP should be done on a sliding scale starting from when a low level player has little or no chance winning, which would reduce death penalty by a percentage up to little or no death penalty applied.

For example,
If a low level player is killed by an attacker that is 10-15 levels higher, the death penalty for the low level will be reduced by a few percentage points. If a level 1 is killed by a level 50, then the death penalty will be reduced by 90-100%. All the levels in between will decrease death penalty proportionately.

The numbers are just an example for clarity and can be adjusted as needed. The important point is, I think death penalty (including dropped resources) should reduce for a ganked player when that player has no possibility of winning due to level difference; and, the death penalty reduction should be greater as the ganked player level decreases.

The only exploit that I can think of for this is to use low level players as mules to protect resources if the gatherer(s) end up getting attacked.

What does everyone think about this?

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Comments

Vhaeyne

It is not going to be a problem. Going red has costs. There might be a handful of jackasses that go red on low-level alts to troll low-level players here and there, but low-level characters do not give any reward worth the risk of going red.

This is not WOW where there is no reason not to kill any other faction player you see. You are making a very costly risk when attacking another player. Ideally, you would want it to be worth it to you in some way. "Pwning N00bs" is not worth going red for. Especially if getting a character to the point that you can do so is an investment.

Biccus

The death penalty argument and unfair on the weaklings was one I was on your side with. I think sliding death penalties just seems like lot of work though and I’d rather they keep with the approach of making ganking undesirable by deterrents.

I’d rather see forced corruption on the ganker whether the ganked player fights back or not. (Obviously strictly based on overwhelming level disparity)
At least that way if the player tries to get away through CC or slows then the offender still get corruption.

I’d also be happy to see corruption added on kill assists, maybe at a reduced rate but again, I would prefer to see a deterrent for killing players indirectly. (examples being hitting them low enough they die to the mob or hitting them with CC until the mob kills them)

Edit: Having read Vhaeyne’s reply I will concede he does have a point and I’d like to trust his experience over my lack thereof with the systems. My worries are hypothetical.

ThexBlackxKnight

What keeps high level players of enemy nodes or guilds at war with your own ganking low level players all day long? I have not heard anything about that , they dont get corrupted for it as far as know.

FuryBladeborne

@Vhaeyne
In the first MMO I played with PVP everywhere and a system of PK points and going red like in Ashes (which was Conquor Online), I joined an old server on my first character. The experience was terrible. I don't remember the exact numbers, but I had a count on the number of times that max level characters killed me before I leveled about 10 levels to get out of the starter zone. The number was ridiculous. I hated PVP and PKing for years due to that game.

Early on, there will be little or no problem with high level ganking. As a server ages into years, it will become a problem that will grow. Many people will make alts just for ganking or convert abandoned characters into gankers and equip them with gear that they are willing to lose. There will be other reasons.

I am in favor of PVP everywhere with the corruption system as it is. However, I don't think that very low level players with no chance to win a fight due to level difference; which they did not provoke, should have to suffer the full death penalties.

Also, adding this system has no impact on the rest of PVP. The is no change in fights between characters where either side has a chance of winning. This idea only reduces the penalty for being the ganked low level player which IS has indicated wanting to protect by increasing the corruption penalty for the ganker.

maouw

Also, isn't the penalty for dying at low levels easier to recover than the penalty for dying at higher levels?
I feel like a low level character doesn't have much to lose.

FuryBladeborne

ThexBlackxKnight wrote: »

What keeps high level players of enemy nodes or guilds at war with your own ganking low level players all day long? I have not heard anything about that , they dont get corrupted for it as far as know.

I'm pretty sure there isn't a restriction. Such a war might drive new recruits or other low levels out of the group that is at war.

Songcaller

In the last PvP Server I played our levelling healers were under so much focussed attention that it took months for our levelling healers to actually level. You really can hinder guilds if you want to.

FuryBladeborne

Biccus wrote: »

The death penalty argument and unfair on the weaklings was one I was on your side with. I think sliding death penalties just seems like lot of work though and I’d rather they keep with the approach of making ganking undesirable by deterrents.

I’d rather see forced corruption on the ganker whether the ganked player fights back or not. (Obviously strictly based on overwhelming level disparity)
At least that way if the player tries to get away through CC or slows then the offender still get corruption.

I’d also be happy to see corruption added on kill assists, maybe at a reduced rate but again, I would prefer to see a deterrent for killing players indirectly. (examples being hitting them low enough they die to the mob or hitting them with CC until the mob kills them)

Edit: Having read Vhaeyne’s reply I will concede he does have a point and I’d like to trust his experience over my lack thereof with the systems. My worries are hypothetical.

The math behind subtracting the difference between character levels and applying a percentage multiplier is extremely simple. I'm quite confident that the devs are fully capable of this. The exact numbers could be tested when the corruption system is tested in Alpha 2. The important part is the concept of whether low levels with no chance to win a fight that they did not start should suffer the full death penalty.

FYI, there is an exploitable problem with forcing corruption on a high level ganking player. Currently, corruption is awarded if the defender is not in combat and the attacker killed them. If the attacker will gain corruption regardless of whether the low level is in combat, then low levels can attack high levels to provoke a kill and allow high level friends to kill the high level without corruption penalties.

Vhaeyne

@FuryBladeborne

Sounds like the costs for going red did not out weigh whatever "Reward" people feel when they PK low-level players in "Conquor Online".

In Ashes they are trying like hell to balance that so that you have the freedom to do it, but it is not generally worthwhile to do it.

The Corruption system, no name change, no server change, high repair costs, XP debt, ect. These features all help to make people think twice before doing anything. Which is also the ticket to how we get a world where reputation matters.

If you gank people regularly. Good luck, getting invited to anything that is worth doing.

FuryBladeborne

maouw wrote: »

Also, isn't the penalty for dying at low levels easier to recover than the penalty for dying at higher levels?
I feel like a low level character doesn't have much to lose.

That would depend on how many times the character dies and how much the player hates dying and its consequences. Its fairly individual.

FuryBladeborne

Removed this message made in error.

maouw

FuryBladeborne wrote: »

.

hold up.

you only turn corrupted when you KILL the low level when they don't attack.
This only works if the low level triggers you in chat to kill them.

ThexBlackxKnight

FuryBladeborne wrote: »

I'm pretty sure there isn't a restriction. Such a war might drive new recruits or other low levels out of the group that is at war.

Sure its easy to leave a guild , not as easy with a node your a citizen of and bailing out of any progress you made with it since a lot progression is not tied to character level. You going to have a entire population of lower level citizens of node at the mercy of high level enemy players who will not take any corruption for ganking them.

FuryBladeborne

maouw wrote: »

FuryBladeborne wrote: »

.

hold up.

you only turn corrupted when you KILL the low level when they don't attack.
This only works if the low level triggers you in chat to kill them.

I'm not sure where your going with this, but I think my quote was in response to the idea by Biccus to give corruption if a high level kills a low level regardless of whether the low level fights back.

Biccus

FuryBladeborne wrote: »

There is an exploitable problem with forcing corruption on a high level ganking player. Currently, corruption is awarded if the defender is not in combat and the attacker killed them. If the attacker will gain corruption regardless of whether the low level is in combat, then low levels can attack high levels to provoke a kill and allow high level friends to kill the high level without corruption penalties.

Okay, this is why I had to edit and say I don’t have experience with the system, this example is way more toxic. So There’s likely no perfect answer. There seems to be potential issues with every idea that gets suggested

FuryBladeborne

Vhaeyne wrote: »

@FuryBladeborne

Sounds like the costs for going red did not out weigh whatever "Reward" people feel when they PK low-level players in "Conquor Online".

In Ashes they are trying like hell to balance that so that you have the freedom to do it, but it is not generally worthwhile to do it.

The Corruption system, no name change, no server change, high repair costs, XP debt, ect. These features all help to make people think twice before doing anything. Which is also the ticket to how we get a world where reputation matters.

If you gank people regularly. Good luck, getting invited to anything that is worth doing.

I just want to make sure that you saw this earlier, "Many people will make alts just for ganking or convert abandoned characters into gankers and equip them with gear that they are willing to lose. There will be other reasons.".

The point is that some people will find a way to deal with corruption in way that is acceptable to them even if it is only using an abandoned character (such as class they no longer like, perhaps it is not meta) or leveling up an alt for PKing. The problem will grow over years; and, I personally don't think that low levels being ganked by such players should not have to suffer the full death penalty.

Songcaller

Are we certain a 'ganker' doesn't get corruption from lower level players regardless of whether the low level player fights back or not? I've seen little to suggest this isn't the case but the wiki does not cover this, I've merely taken a quote from steven which says 'Higher level players will gain corruption for killing low level players'.

Vhaeyne

FuryBladeborne wrote: »

Vhaeyne wrote: »

@FuryBladeborne

Sounds like the costs for going red did not out weigh whatever "Reward" people feel when they PK low-level players in "Conquor Online".

In Ashes they are trying like hell to balance that so that you have the freedom to do it, but it is not generally worthwhile to do it.

The Corruption system, no name change, no server change, high repair costs, XP debt, ect. These features all help to make people think twice before doing anything. Which is also the ticket to how we get a world where reputation matters.

If you gank people regularly. Good luck, getting invited to anything that is worth doing.

I just want to make sure that you saw this earlier, "Many people will make alts just for ganking or convert abandoned characters into gankers and equip them with gear that they are willing to lose. There will be other reasons.".

The point is that some people will find a way to deal with corruption in way that is acceptable to them even if it is only using an abandoned character (such as class they no longer like, perhaps it is not meta) or leveling up an alt for PKing. The problem will grow over years; and, I personally don't think that low levels being ganked by such players should have to suffer the full death penalty.

Ohh, I have seen it. If leveling an alt just to gank takes enough time and energy, people will not do it.

What are they going to get for all of this investment in leveling up a character to gank? Some low tier mats and a maybe a little euphoria? Let's be real here, easy leveling and catch up mechanics are what you should be worried about.

This is also part of the reason why the penalties for being red stack to be so harsh. You quickly won't be able to gank anyone. Even if someone only leveled to like lvl 20 to gank players lower than lvl 10. It should take them days to get to lvl 20. The shit lvl 10 and below characters have is just not worth taking. You could instead just make a tanky alt that is good at gathering and getting away. That would be a much wiser investment in anyone's time.

Again, a handful of jackasses will want to see the world burn occasionally, but they will be losing a character in the process. If they balance things correctly no one will waste their time on low lvl players enough for it to warrent discussion.

FuryBladeborne

Vhaeyne wrote: »

FuryBladeborne wrote: »

Vhaeyne wrote: »

@FuryBladeborne

Sounds like the costs for going red did not out weigh whatever "Reward" people feel when they PK low-level players in "Conquor Online".

In Ashes they are trying like hell to balance that so that you have the freedom to do it, but it is not generally worthwhile to do it.

The Corruption system, no name change, no server change, high repair costs, XP debt, ect. These features all help to make people think twice before doing anything. Which is also the ticket to how we get a world where reputation matters.

If you gank people regularly. Good luck, getting invited to anything that is worth doing.

I just want to make sure that you saw this earlier, "Many people will make alts just for ganking or convert abandoned characters into gankers and equip them with gear that they are willing to lose. There will be other reasons.".

The point is that some people will find a way to deal with corruption in way that is acceptable to them even if it is only using an abandoned character (such as class they no longer like, perhaps it is not meta) or leveling up an alt for PKing. The problem will grow over years; and, I personally don't think that low levels being ganked by such players should have to suffer the full death penalty.

Ohh, I have seen it. If leveling an alt just to gank takes enough time and energy, people will not do it.

What are they going to get for all of this investment in leveling up a character to gank? Some low tier mats and a maybe a little euphoria? Let's be real here, easy leveling and catch up mechanics are what you should be worried about.

This is also part of the reason why the penalties for being red stack to be so harsh. You quickly won't be able to gank anyone. Even if someone only leveled to like lvl 20 to gank players lower than lvl 10. It should take them days to get to lvl 20. The shit lvl 10 and below characters have is just not worth taking. You could instead just make a tanky alt that is good at gathering and getting away. That would be a much wiser investment in anyone's time.

Again, a handful of jackasses will want to see the world burn occasionally, but they will be losing a character in the process. If they balance things correctly no one will waste their time on low lvl players enough for it to warrent discussion.

Since it apparent that you recognize that ganking will happen to some extent (regardless of whatever reasons we want to argue about for it); then, my opinion is that I think low levels being ganked by such players should not have to suffer the full death penalty.

Is there any particular reason why a low level player that did not provoke a high level player should have to suffer the full death penalty? As in, is the player being punished by death for a mistake that the player should have corrected to avoid being ganked?

(Also, leveling an alt character for days is nothing. I think that I have 20+ max level characters in GW2, most of them made for specific purposes such as gathering an extra time per day. I don't know how many months I put into making them, but out of the 5+ years that I played it, I put many months into them. If a player wants a ganking alt, the player can make it.)

ThexBlackxKnight

Vhaeyne wrote: »

Again, a handful of jackasses will want to see the world burn occasionally, but they will be losing a character in the process. If they balance things correctly no one will waste their time on low lvl players enough for it to warrent discussion.

What if a node is at war with another , would not be a worth while strategy to keep low level players from gathering resources to hurt the other nodes economy? You can freely gank them with no penalty.

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