Couple of days ago our Armory got robbed by a Wilde character. The pretty long chase ensued and it was actually pretty intense RP experience. Well, at least I enjoyed it. We finally cornered him. I was blown out of the sky, but after sometime into the fighting The Wilde was a gent in the end and dropped the equipment before cruising away. BUT there happened to be a certain individual who had been monitoring the system comms and joined the fight and tractored some of our equipment and took off.
Understandably we are dying to get our hands on him now. We know his name and he's a marked man, but since he was a indie character (not a bash to indies in general, but if he were in a faction we could RP this out properly) an ugly thing just occurred that he can change the name as many times as he likes. This makes it impossible (at least I know no way of tracking him with the information we have) to catch him. Is there a way at player's disposal to keep track of this guy?
I know the admins have and keep logs and that's the only hope really left.
We would like to keep this thing in RP, so could there be deviced some sort of mechanics to get the identity of a player? Like a 10 mil for a "hint"? As things stand now people can "vanish" without a trace.
What I'm looking for a way to keep this in RP and to be able to hunt this guy down. Even if it costs credits to get the information.
And this also affects bounties also.
RP wise i see nothing wrong. Consider him a pirate of opertunity,or a junker who was at the right place, at the right time. All he did was tractor in loot and run. Sound's like the perfect heist to me.
PS. i am not him,and all my char's are listed in my sig.
Alas, I have to agree with you on that.
It is now too easy for any Indie Character to get away with just about anything he likes now and can laugh in the faces of all those who are indeed commited to better RP.
As is, with the current system, anyone with a decent ammount of money can change their name at will, escaping from posted Bounties, getting away with giving other players hell or starting rumors and lies, then change name and claim they know nothing, ect ect...things they can do with this can go on and on.
What I would honestly think practical is an announcement system. When a player changes his name, its Lists the change in chat, much like the Kill Messages do. It would make it a bit harder to hide from those who are paying attnetion.
Just my thought on this.
' Wrote:What I'm looking for a way to keep this in RP and to be able to hunt this guy down. Even if it costs credits to get the information.
And this also affects bounties also.
I know proposing yet another ID is 'forum bane' but what if the admins or moderators had seperate characters that sported an "Informant" ID? For a
very large fee, these people can (for the sake of pitch) call someone who knows someone who is friendly with a bartender that is an aquantence of a guy that happens to know how to get that kind of info?
Personally, I'd pay for that kind of intellegence if I ever needed it.
I agree with all of you.
Ryoken, it was indeed a good heist on his part and I have no problem with the action itself. Only grudge is that if he chooses (I don't know if he has changed his name or not) not to live with the consequences of it and changes the name.
I agree with Marburg. You put it to words exactly what I'm trying say. I'm willing to pay for such an information. Admins really could introduce a Snitch ID or operation here in the forums.
This thing is not about money or equipment lost. It's about principle of punishing the thief.
But rest assured. I won't lose any sleep over it or go hunting the guy with my char out of my ZOI or make a life mission out of exacting revenge on the guy. Nothing so stupid. All I'm asking for is a RP way to get back at the guy.
the name change has become easier indeed. - but its still the same mechanic - sort of. it costs 2 million credits - and it can only be done once a week. - the only thing that really changed is that there is no "namechange thread" anymore that one can check to keep track.
in RP, the namechange is somewhat plausible - but this argument stinks in a way. - in RL, there is much more than just a name to identify a person. here in freelancer ( resp. every online game ) the name is the single most important item to identiy someone. - so a namechange is equal to a full change of identity in RL - including to abandon friends, the place you re living your habits etc.
i think that the novelty of a fast and easy namechange with "only" a quick command line is tempting - but it wears off. .... what makes RP interesting is usually the conflict and dealing with consequences. ( something like, you often see little kids play war... but you hardly ever see them play peace ) - so those that are interested in dealing with what they did in a RP sense will not use that "freature" anyway. - only when hostilities might reach a level that is beond the character and aims for the player, they will prolly namechange.
then there are those that would change the name at any occasion. - they would have done so with the old system, too... and while it was possible to keep track, it was also tedious and not to mention... kinda metagaming as what was posted on the namechange place was hardly for the characters eyes. - and i cannot remember ANYONE posting a roleplay about investigating someones changed identity ( nither in stories nor ingame i ever encountered that )
what this "features" helps though is to change a charname "on the spot" - kind of ... just in the situation you need it. - when you know people are looking for you.
i remember the rediculous bounties on at least 2 players as high as 500.000.000 credits. - if the player feels harrassed by that, which actually is kind of true, when half the server turns on you to kill you, - such a player might change the identity and turn invisible for the bounty, hence - making such a bounty pointless. but at least that is an occation that a "full change of identity" can be justified.
all in all, i think the new namechange does not affect our roleplay much. it can spoil it sometimes - but not as much as server crashes, lag or sometimes parents in RL. its a minor nuicense but can also offer the same amount of RP depth if applied in a responsible way. personally, i see it rather beneficial than detrimental, even if it can affect the server in both ways.
Jinx, you seem to have overlooked something. People in real life actualy do spend large sums of money to find a person who has taken a new identity. So who's to say people won't dish out 5-20 mil even up to 150 mil to collect a 500 mil bounty. If they want it that bad, they will. I definitely wouldn't mind buying that sort of information.
I'm going to assume that the server can only remember X-amount of name changes for a character before the original gets pushed off. If that's the case, then a player would have to change his/her name more than 2 or 3 times to make a "Clean" getaway (costing over 4 mil and is easily roleplayed). but this requires time and credits. Even then, there are still ways someone could track someone down if you have the know how and resources. I think it's possible to RP informant and PI's, though these jobs can easily be fulfilled by House Authorty IDs, and Merc IDs. Perhaps it' will give those OORP Indi Mercs some incentive to Roleplay?
Why someone would wanna get out of a bounty like that, I can't fathom. I live to get bounties placed on me (the last one put on Armoury.007 was hilarious and great fun), to me it's really cool.
That being said, I agree with Jinx - more good than bad in the new system.
The self-serve NC system is great, & I agree 100% but Looq's topic brings up something that will have to be addressed sooner or later anyway.
There will always be a percentage of people that will abuse the new system for one reason or another, & we will need a new way to counter that abuse.
IRL people go underground & hop off the grid for all sorts of reasons: avoiding the cops or feds, getting out of paying child support, hiding from an abusive or psycho ex, getting away from gang violence, you name it...
Anyway, Finding a new way in RP to counter possible grid jumpers is (imho) a great path to walk on, 'cause searching the old NCC thread for peoples changes was metagaming in my eyes, & I love the new system for making that obsolete.
Now, I can see a wide open & (for the most part) untapped industry.
It doesn't matter if it's a job as a snitch, informant, private investigator, black market infoteer, whatever...
The point is, even if there is only one guilty person located located out of a hundred, at least the steps to bloodhound someone would be in RP
gota agree with jinx on this one, the rename command adds more good than bad, it now adds a whole new dimension to being able to RP as spec ops (or covert ops)
if our cover gets blown, we can change Identities