A serious concern indeed. It strikes me to notice how both 'extreme types' of players you refer to are represented in the community here as well. Both hoping to optimally enjoy CoE in the 'gameplay mode' they prefer. Without proper control mechanics there is a risk of wolves preying on sheep and the community getting polarised. The (heavily metagame supported) emergence of assassin/crime syndicates in this stage may be foreboding an iceberg we cannot oversee yet. I hope the game developers are fully aware of said risk and will ensure there will be effective 'mechanistic' restrictions on unconsented/disruptive PvP in case the 'soft tools' and/or the community using them turn out to be not effective enough to maintain a reasonably 'level playing field' for all types of players. Based on the many 'act(uat)ors', both virtual and real, in place or still under development, I have high hopes that eventually the intrinsic mechanics of the game will ensure most 'selfish and short-term PvP fun focussed' players will not be able to ruin the game and community experience on a significantly large scale, both in time and space.

Well, from what I remember each kill, as in Coup de Grâce, will effect your lifespan or soul in a bad way.

I am sure some one will be able to shine a brighter light on that part, than my little Kipyq beam.

Posted By Ibenholt at 6:47 PM - Sat Sep 15 2018

Well, from what I remember each kill, as in Coup de Grâce, will effect your lifespan or soul in a bad way.

Only if you’re caught AND punished. There will be evidence of crimes left, to what extent, is still in development. There will be ways to investigate crimes. Laws will be written by players and we will have tools to enforce laws and there will be a certain level of punishment that can be attached to crimes. So yes, I’m theory, cold blooded murder could result in a decrease in the time left on the convicted’s spark, but it’s certainly not automatic.

Posted By dmagnenat at

Is Chronicles of Elyria going to be a FFA PvP ?

Yes.

There are no factions or safe zones. Every player and npc can be killed.

“I know there are kind of rules and contracts, but will the contracts and rules be enforced in a way that make them taken seriously ?”

There has been a lot of discussion on this topic, but those systems are still being developed.

There are more factors at play than just penalties as well. Such as reputation: among players and npcs. With a player run economy that doesn’t allow for quick travel or auto sending of goods, being able to openly trade based is going to be a big deal. If you’re KOS by most of the local guards, you’re going to find life much more difficult.

Another thought: with tech like discord, it may be easier for people to rally support against bandits/pkers than it was a decade ago.

I would like to add also that a 3D engine has nothing to do with what coding is done to curb the griefing and PKing.

The only thing the 3D engine has to do with is how well the graphics look compared to whatever engines and graphics cards come out during development and after the game is launched.

So far the screenshots taken have graphics that are photo realistic enough to hold up for a while, at least for my liking.

Never played Shadowbane, but how big was the world? Cause that seems to be a key point of CoE. The world is fucking huge. If I spawn in whatever duchy, hell probably won't ever leave the starting county. The travel time is just too extreme.

So the example I love to use, is the game may turn into mad max, it would only be for that area. The chance that even one duchy could turn into mad max land seems low.

While on that same thought (yes too lazy to look up any real details on shadowbane). Does it have NPCs within it, like tens of thousands of them? Like CoE plans to have? We could argue all day about how great they end up being. But if you need to be at least trained and in good gear to take them on. While need to be in a group, of 20-50 to take down a town. That again limits how much damage one group can even do.

Following that thought, how hard was gear to get in Shadowbane? How hard was doing really anything. Did you read that smithy DJ? A simple blade taking around 20 minutes to make, roughly, you can't just magically gear any size army out in a day. Not even taking into account getting the raw materials either. Which is at least the problem with games like rust/ark etc. All too easy to gear up and get a lead over others.

Then the final point, you can't just take a fire arrow and burn a forest/town to the ground. You need siege equipment. How easy that will be to build is also something else.

With all that, I doubt the whole game world would become mad max land. No doubt some areas may turn into that. But overall? Seems too unlikely. Like any type of player, if a bunch of murdering hobos are destroying one area near you. No doubt the "good" "peaceful" whatever you wanna call them. Will rally together and fight them off. Having the help of NPCs is going to be nice as well.

It all really comes down to making sure you pick a good spot. I know there are many pvp groups on one server within one kingdom. Yeah don't go near them. The world is big enough you can somewhat hide from them. Or do the other thing, those pvp groups need crafters to keep them going. Join em.

few things to point out, it is not Full loot. it is what is in your bags, this is diferent than most MMOS. since this method makes you want to equip your best gear and not leave it in a bag or never wear it.

second with the proposed "smart AI" being an asshat griefer will cause the game to hate you too. so this isnt a game where a npc 5 feet away will not care about you murdering an entire family for fun.

It actually basically is full loot. You get to fully loot the person if you perma kill them.

Looting

A question people often have about being incapacitated or Spirit Walking is how that affects other players looting their body. There are three different types of looting in Chronicles of Elyria, each corresponding to a different type of death. The first, Quick Looting, is what you can do if someone is simply incapacitated. The second form of looting, called Inventory Looting, becomes available whenever someone is the victim of a coup de grace. The final form of looting, Corpse Looting, becomes possible any time the soul is unable to return to their host and the body becomes a corpse (permadeath).

It should be noted that looting a body, whether alive or dead, is a crime. If caught and arrested you’ll face charges for your actions. For your typical mundane items it may prove difficult to prove someone stole something from you, but more rare/valuable items or family heirlooms often have a sigil or mark on them identifying who the real owner is.

Quick Loot

In the short period of time while someone is unconscious you have only enough time to grab a few quick things. In specific, you can cut the unconscious person’s purse and take any money they had, or you can take any items which they might have been carrying in their hands. This includes any animals they may have been guiding by the reins or riding (including pack animals).

What you won’t have time to do is unbuckle anything (this includes the belt & scabbard), remove any armor, rummage through their backpack, or otherwise search the body. Anything not in the coin purse, or held in their hands remains the property of the owner.

Inventory Loot

When someone is Spirit Walking you have a bit more time to grab items off their person. In addition to anything you could take while Quick Looting, you can unbuckle their belt to take their sword and scabbard, remove any rings or other jewelry they may be wearing, or take or rummage through their backpack to see if there’s anything of value.

Corpse Loot

The final form of looting is called Corpse Looting. Whenever you come across a corpse, you can take all items from the corpse. This isn’t just limited to items the corpse is wearing.

As many described above me, CoE has severe punishment if you get caught. If a NPC sees you kill someone, they're going to scream or report it or try to capture you etc. If you get caught, depending on the laws, or if they add jail, whatever the case may be, you will lose a chunk of your life. Which shaves off a chunk of your "subscription/spark". Now, this may not mean a whole lot to some people because they can just buy another spark yaddie yadda, but to most, they aren't going to go around griefing wasting money to respawn and go around griefing more. You have to be smart about it. If you don't perma kill the person you incapacitated, you're screwed if they know what you look like unless you get a new disguise because they can just walk over and rat you out for killing/attempting to kill them.

There are various ways that griefing gets punished in a good/equal way in the game thankfully.

Crime will certainly be possible anywhere, but so will law enforcement, to a degree that other games don't allow:

Crimes don't just expire like the weak flagging systems that other games use.

Official player-run governments can issue bounties using tax money.

Characters are still present in the world while offline.

Characters have limited lifespans that can be shortened by arrest or execution.

Reputation and gossip mechanics can give you a bad reputation that will make people trust you less.

Elyria will probably have a lot of troublemakers in the early days, but they'll taper off when they log in and find out their characters lost lifespan from being arrested.

Posted By Natural20 at 2:38 PM - Sun Sep 16 2018

Crime will certainly be possible anywhere, but so will law enforcement, to a degree that other games don't allow:

Crimes don't just expire like the weak flagging systems that other games use.

Official player-run governments can issue bounties using tax money.

Characters are still present in the world while offline.

Characters have limited lifespans that can be shortened by arrest or execution.

Reputation and gossip mechanics can give you a bad reputation that will make people trust you less.

Elyria will probably have a lot of troublemakers in the early days, but they'll taper off when they log in and find out their characters were arrested.

I don't fully understand what the developers are planning for criminals. There have been huge discussions focused around jail systems which the community seem divided over, I can't see how arresting a criminal will work unless you're forced to execute them, there's hardly any information about it.

Posted By Gunnlang at 04:28 AM - Sun Sep 16 2018

Then the final point, you can't just take a fire arrow and burn a forest/town to the ground. You need siege equipment. How easy that will be to build is also something else.

Caspian also said, that you just can't take a torch, or some fire arrows and burn down a village in a few minutes. And that it will take longer to raise a building, than it took to build it. Which in most games works the other way around!

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By KipFoE at 01:04 AM - Sun Sep 16 2018

Posted By Ibenholt at 6:47 PM - Sat Sep 15 2018

Well, from what I remember each kill, as in Coup de Grâce, will effect your lifespan or soul in a bad way.

Only if you’re caught AND punished. There will be evidence of crimes left, to what extent, is still in development. There will be ways to investigate crimes. Laws will be written by players and we will have tools to enforce laws and there will be a certain level of punishment that can be attached to crimes. So yes, I’m theory, cold blooded murder could result in a decrease in the time left on the convicted’s spark, but it’s certainly not automatic.

Yes, you need to be catched and trailed, which might be way easier than in other games, due to the fact that a char will stay ingame even if the player logs out and due to a skill that lets you analyse crime spots and helps you find the perpetrator.

BUT their is also the reknown system or what SBS calls it. Remember that amount of playtime / lifetime that a char is loosing Coup de Grace varies depending on his "rank / reknown".

Which means, that a normal crafter, or merchant that gets killed looses amount A of his lifetime, while a mayor, or a count looses A multiplied by X. Which goes up to the king, who looses so much lifetime with every Coup de Grace, that char will be dead after 3-4 times. While a normal unkown local merchant might live through countless of Coup de Grace.

This system does not work for people with rank and title, BUT also for chars that are known. If you are the richest merchant of your duchy you will be as well known as the duke of this duchy. And if you are the greatest general of your kingdom, or a legendary dragon slayer, you might just be as famous and well known thought the land, as the king is.

And you will also suffer the consequences for it, if you suffer a Coup de Grace.

Same goes for your killer! If he hasn't just killed only one guy, but is the baine of the royal capital, like "Jack the Ripper", or if he is a famous highwayman like "Robert -Three Fingered - Birtch", he will also suffer a bigger lifetime loss if he suffers a Goup de Grace - on top - of what ever will happen if the he ever gets caugth.

The next thing is, that Caspian also posted around two years ago, that they will watch the amount of criminal activity and if it gets out of hand, they will adjust the punishment or increase the chance to find criminals due to ingame skills, to make crime less attractive.

There is another important factor that makes Chronicles of Eylria different from games like Shadowbane, Darkfall and Mortal Online.

If you get killed in most FFA MMOs, who cares? You care, your friends might care and maybe a few / all of your guild mates do!

And what can those do? If you remembered the name of your killer, they can look for him. But finding him might not be so easy. You might not know where he went. And in the worst case he could directly have logged out after killing you, to protect the loot and to avoid the risk to get caught by you, or your friends etc.

So what is the difference in CoE? It is about who cares about you getting killed or robbed. If you are merchant, who gets robbed and killed multiple times, your business sufferes and if your buisness sufferes, the taxes of the mayor suffers.

And since you might not the only one who gets killed regularly it will effect the taxes of the counts, the dukes and if it is a really big problem, than it effects the taxes of the kings as well.

And if the mayors aren't able to protect the players / NPCs within their city, they might not only loose taxes, but also might not be reelected. And if the dukes and their barons aren't able to protect those cities and their inhabitants, they might get overthrown by their counts. And so on.

You see... in the best case it is not only you and your friends, that might care about you getting robbed or killed in CoE, but a whole lot of people.

And those who care, be it the players / NPCs of the city guard, the local militia, the sheriff of the duchy, the royal army, or random bounty hunters or adventures looking for some task, all those might have a way easier job finding those malefactors, if the promised investigation system works as intended.

And since there is no loging out of the game, since your char remains in the world after you left, their is a 24/7 chance to get chaught!

Posted By Morne at 03:00 AM - Sun Sep 16 2018

Posted By Natural20 at 2:38 PM - Sun Sep 16 2018

Crime will certainly be possible anywhere, but so will law enforcement, to a degree that other games don't allow:

Crimes don't just expire like the weak flagging systems that other games use.

Official player-run governments can issue bounties using tax money.

Characters are still present in the world while offline.

Characters have limited lifespans that can be shortened by arrest or execution.

Reputation and gossip mechanics can give you a bad reputation that will make people trust you less.

Elyria will probably have a lot of troublemakers in the early days, but they'll taper off when they log in and find out their characters were arrested.

I don't fully understand what the developers are planning for criminals. There have been huge discussions focused around jail systems which the community seem divided over, I can't see how arresting a criminal will work unless you're forced to execute them, there's hardly any information about it.

Yeah, they've been quiet about the details there. I for one am a proponent of fining them or, if they can't pay, shortening their lives; I really doubt that anything more would be engaging. This still has to be an actual game for everyone involved.

Thanks for your answers. Special thanks to @VioletWinter for her calm and furnished answer, and to @Zunjin for her constructive explanation of the big picture.

I'm however surprised/deceived that nobody found interesting to make the comparison with Shadobane (and watch the video).

I'm not talking about fire arrow or siege engine as this more on the warfare side on a larger scale (though also part of the PvP part). I'm rather interested in talking about the small scale (say 1 to 6 outlaws ganking small group (1-2) travelers).

If I raise such question, is because I want CoE to success.

I'd like to say that I asked this question to start debate, in order to raise the attention of the dev team so that, we will be able to play a great game where "Wolves" exists but in a way they are dealable.

Playing an Assassin, or an Outlaw is one the things that is thrilling and interesting for both sides.

Don't underestimate the dark side... ;) There will be players agreeing to pay for additional spark of life on the same level as those paying huge amount to be mayor, count, duke or whatever gentry.

The player that perform hardcore/outlaw PvP are usually well trained in the game mechanics, and exploit every bit of weakness. Don't expect them to perform kill with witness around.

My vision is that within settlement, the security should be high enough in order that (one-to-one) crimes get punished quickly, though a band of Outlaw should still be able to cause trouble on a small hamlet. That would be the interesting part for the duke to deal with in order to chase the band of outlaw with patrols. ;)

I'm just hoping the "life-drain" for a coup-de-grace would only occur if you get caught. Otherwise, it's going into the opposite direction of their design pillars, such as "Dramatic Realism".

One can RP-justify a "life-drain" when caught by sentence to death and a stay in prison where you are badly fed. On the other hand, there is not any RP-justification for a "Life-drain" when the killer is not caught.

So I think we need some more in depth elaborated ways of refraining Outlaw to cause damage to this game in a sens where too much sheep leave the game and cause a financial fail.

This may come from the players and-or the game system itself, or maybe, and very likely a mix of both.