Thievery and Ignoring Players

Please correct me if I am wrong, but somewhere I recall hearing that people will have the ability to ignore people, in which doing so, they will no longer show up to each other. If this is so, would that mean people who choose the thievery lifestyle will just be ignored by every player which would ultimately destroy the profession?

 

Not necessarily. First off thieving is a form of PvP.. so the thief probably won't be seeing non-PvPers all that much to begin with.. and those who do a lot of PvP may be open to being stolen from. It's just one of the risks involved depending on what the risks to thieves are. This also means thief beware.. your marks will all likely have the capacity and willingness to try to kill you if they catch you.

Aside from this, there is the possibility of NPC targets.. I'm not sure if this has been discussed or not but possibly stealing from NPC buildings..

I don't really think not seeing a few players will kill the profession.

 

Well, a sub point is, if you decide to be a thief, and players know you are doing it, then they ignore you, if this continues, will the thieves all find themselves being pushed out of more social shards? What if this continues for a few years of gameplay? Will we wind up with a "thief zone" where all the thief players have been pushed by massive ignores?

 

I don't think so. Remember that people will PvP voluntarily.. there will be some folks who won't ignore you because they would rather catch you. Besides.. out of thousands or tens of thousands of players there will always be the next mark.

 

I do think that the way it will be setup that bank thieves will be a thing of the past... I don't really mind this so much because bank thieves are generally just annoying. I have a thief in UO that was quite good and I would sometimes prey on people at the bank out of boredom, but I often found that bank thieves are generally just newbie thieves or casual thieves who simply macroed their skill up to 100 so they could annoy people by bank thieving. I'd like to think that players will need to be much more careful with their professions in SotA and there will be less of the casual annoyances we had in UO.

 

I don't remember seeing specifics, but as far as I know, what will happen is that people playing in single player or friends play online won't be available for thieves, as well as anyone in open play online that isn't "flagged" for PvP. So someone that gets tired of being a victim will likely just need to drop out of PvP, or out of open play online mode, in order to be completely unavailable for thieves.

As for ignoring, I don't think ignoring someone will prevent a player from meeting those he ignored in OPO mode; it might reduce the chance of meeting the ignored player, but I don't think it will guarantee that the players will never met again, as that guarantee would make it very hard for the instancing tech to ever work.

 

If thieves can be pretty much ignored to where there is no real valid point in doing so anymore, it may be a huge downfall should games like Elder Scrolls Online allow open theft/pvp/etc. Most gamers i meet today aren't so much for "cupcake land (everyones safe mode)" as they are to open exploring mischief/combat. Most big sellers have open pvp and my two cents think it'd be fullish to push aside thieves/pvps. Afterall, what good fantasy game limits the sneaky/stealthy/assassin/thief type?

 

Well, they can always steal from each other

It's a valid concern I think - but what's the solution? Removing the ignore function or just muting the player and allowing griefing to continue are both options I would think are completely off the table. I have nothing else off the top of my head.

 

I would suggest making stealing from players more complicated than walking up to them and opening their inventory. If what we are simulating is actual theft, based not on magic powers but actual slight of hand skills, a study of what people do with those skills in the real world can give us some pointers.

If I have a bag, say, a hiking backpack, strapped to my back, a would be thief cannot just walk up, open it, and start removing things. Especially not heavy things. Not because he cannot move the weight, although that would certainly count. But because I WOULD NOTICE. My backpack suddenly becomes lighter. I look around, and there is a guy right behind me holding my new hiking shoes. That's assuming he was somehow able to remove them without them catching on any part of the bag, or jostling me in any way, which would be based on his skill, but wow, what SKILL! He'd still get caught, 100% of the time, because I can feel the weight of the backpack. Likewise if he started removing large numbers of small objects. He would have to be not only quick, but also slow, doing it gradually. It would make stealing INVOLVED.

Now, if he wanted to just grab my wallet or keys from a loose pocket, that would be MUCH easier. Doable even. But that means there are limited pockets to steal from. I would suggest that a Thief be given fast access to only a bit of change or a random selection of small objects when attempting theft, and that getting more would take time, patience, concentration, and still massively increase his chances of getting caught.

At which point, the theft itself wouldn't be so bad, the catching of anyone who was abusing it would be more likely, and people might be more likely to respond with PvP than with /ignore.

Ultimately though, known thieves DO get kicked out of polite society, so I guess if someone is a real jerk and compulsive about it, they'll get on a lot of lists.

 

Open PvP in TESO? Lol

Even if we didn't already know how it's PvP will work, it's an AAA budget game being released for both PC and consoles. Open PvP is a risk that publishers don't take anymore in games like this, unless it comes with a clear "opt out" mechanic. And you can bet that stealing from other players, and player looting, will also be off the table.

For reference, the world in TESO will be divided in 4 large maps, one for each of the 3 factions plus one exclusively for PvP. PvP is only possible in the PvP map (Cyrodiil), all other zones will be PvE only, and while players can visit the maps of other factions, while doing so they won't be able to even see other faction players.

Not doubting you, but there's a tendency for people to better know other people that share the same interests. It's why arguments along the lines of "all my friends think the same as me" aren't really useful.

This one I really doubt. Unless you are thinking about games that have PvP and PvE servers, in which case there's a clear opt out for open PvP. Or if you are thinking about PvP modes in games like CoD, in which case you are talking about fully consensual PvP, which can't really be used to show demand for non-consensual open PvP.

Also, I believe Ultima Online was the last western AAA-budget MMO to be designed with player looting and/or stealing (EVE was born as a small indie game, so for this specific metric it doesn't count).

 

Optional casual gaming will kill this game, just like Trammel did back in UO. There is no logic in pvp being optional. So if you are roleplaying, you will stay in a world that everyone wants to duel and steal. My expectations are totally ruined, sorry.

 

Like mentioned above thievery would be a form of PvP, and I believe people who are flagged for PvP MUST automatically disable the ban-list feature.

It would ruin theivery and PvP if people could just ban the people they don't want to interact with in PvP mode. Imagine if all the best PvPers were banned by the majority of people just because they were good at PvP. They would be stuck fighting only the best PvPers. That isn't right. Some people should be allowed to be better if they are legitimately better. Also a ban-list defeats the purpose of PvP all together.

So Dev's please keep ban-lists for PvE only. Let there only be a mute feature for people in PvP, and have the ban-list be greyed out.

 

Your expectations are totally ruined? Why do you say this? I would truly like to understand because what I believe Trammel did to Ultima Online is quite different than what will be happening in #LBSotA (omg I hashtagged that... it's a reflex now lol sorry). How so? Because UO was the only MMORPG option for quite some time, but now there are so many, it's not logical to NOT have an opt-in towards PvP. It's the year 2013, not 1997 anymore. Here me out...

PvP being optional is actually quite logical in that it has been stated since the beginning for this game. If you want to participate in struggles against your fellow players, you can adjust your "slider" to OPO mode and be able to steal and fight from the like-minded folks. It resembles being at war with a guild, but the "guild" is actually people geographically near you with the same "slider" option or even across the globe, as long as you have some sort of "same interest". It's also been stated that certain Points of Interest will automatically cause you to be flagged for PvP, so there will be plenty of adventurers seeking something that will have to put up a fight.

Back to the topic though... I'm surprised no one has mentioned thievery towards an NPC and what that can garner... especially with this type of storyline.

 

What I think the OP was tying to say is that somebody could remain in PvP mode but ban any of the people that bother them. I agree with the OP that such a ban list defeats the purpose of opting in on PvP. If they have a ban-list it should be greyed out as soon as you click the PvP toggle. Ban-list should be for PvE only.

 

I completely agree with both of you on that regard. Either there is a time limit set (kind of like being grey) or not being able to at all, will work towards these specific modes of play.

 

oh ok cool. I hope the devs agree too.

 

Are you trying to troll me ? Just because there are MMORPGs around, you aren't meant to clone them. T2A UO was and is unique because of its hardcoreness, its combat. Now what you are doing is cloning the casual MMORPGs

 

Not trolling at all, apologies if it came out like that.

You are correct that UO T2A was unique, that's exactly what I typed... we're NEVER going to see an exact replica of it. Ever. I don't see how SotA is cloning other MMORPGs when it's not even an MMO per se.

 

To complement, for a pre-Trammel UO clone to be even possible, you would need to find a player base that isn't really into PvP but still accepts being targeted by PvPers. That is not going to happen; given the number of other games nowadays that cater to PvE players, whenever a game makes PvP mandatory, the players that aren't into PvP just leave, and the resulting game becomes closer to post-Trammel Felucca than to pre-Trammel UO.

 

*Raises Hand*
On a side note, Atariel.

Your opening claim is a huge assertion to make, and while I feel the pain that many of us felt at the dawn of Trammel, the reality is that forced hardcore gaming is what would kill this game. The times are more cupcake oriented yes, but that doesn't mean that you can't have a community of players (in the OPO mode) who bring roleplaying, crafting, and other non-combat skills to the table in addition to pvp. If I understand right, OPO forces you into an open-pvp world if you want to capture that MMO feeling. There is no OPO trammel slider. You either play alone, with your friends, or in a dangerous world (As a staunch supporter of getting slain while I mine, that is more than enough to keep me happy). Also, can someone confirm this to be sure?