Flow said: "I completely agree, defiance is a nice example, you never really get any better, it makes the game kind of... tedious "

Having played Defiance for a few months I agree. The best time I had playing it was when I was first starting out and everything was new. After beating the main story twice through and maxing out 2 weapons, nothing ever seemed to get easier. I mean I got better at defeating various opponents because I got to know the intricacies of the game mechanics not because my character ever felt like he was improving. I eventually got to the point where it just felt like I was doing the daily/weekly goals in one day just to get them out of the way, like doing unpleasant chores.

I would hate the same thing to happen with this game.

Actually, I was always annoyed with the fact that no matter how good I got, the frickin' Rikti would grind my face into the asphalt...

Steve

Maybe the PvP flag is only a trigger for NPC reactions, it starts immediately for PCs.

However, another problem is the high level villain trashing civilians just to get your low level hero to commit.

Steve

kitsune9tails wrote:

Now that tech has weighed in a bit, let me voice my main concern.
I log into the game. I intend to play a true blue hero type. I see a PC beating up on a helpless civilian. I want to interfere, I am willing to PvP, but I can't, because he hasn't defeated/harassed enough civilians to set off his PvP flag yet.
This situation would appear to me to be not only an RP problem, but a mechanical imbalance as well (especially if the criminal player is getting rewards from harassing civilians).
It only gets worse if I am unwilling to PvP (although partly my fault, we don't want to discourage PvE). Now the criminal can follow me around beating up the helpless in my presence, but I can't do anything about it. Even worse, NPC crime fighters can jump him in my presence, but I can't. It would seem like Superman telling Batman "you can't help us fight Doomsday, go home."
This is why I think you should get the option to go PvP whenever menacing an NPC on the street, and have to go PvP to continue, and that street PvP should take place in an instance so you aren't forced to witness harm being done to civilians you cannot deal with.
Maybe we could use phasing to service dedicated street sweepers, so they don't have to deal with PvP flags and such. Maybe targeting a street NPC gives you the option of a 'street sweeper mode' that puts you in a phase of the world with all other street sweepers of a similar alignment/reputation?
Not a tech, just some thoughts...

I agree that it could be of particular concern. It's why I believe that *IF* we are to explore this possibility, we'll need to discuss all the merits and flaws and how to best address them. The result of which will tell us if we can move forward into actual implementation.

One of my talking points for when we discuss this includes the issue of hero PC's encountering the villain PC causing a disturbance and essentially being powerless to help the citizens if the offender isn't willng to PvP.

There are three ways to possibly resolve this:

1. Attacking a civilian triggers a phased event. The villain PCs then deal with escalating threats based on the location. Triggering the Disturbance is a mandatory flag for PvP allowing heroes who are notified of the Disturbance to decide if they wish to engage allowing them to enter the phase. If heroes enter the phase this concluded the pve portion of the event as the pve mobs "back" off.

2. Attacking a civilian triggers a phased event. The villain PCs then deal with escalating threats based on the location. Triggering a Disturbance creates an optional PvP flag. Villain PCs can opt to stay in the event as pve only and continue until completed or defeated.

3. Attacking a civilian triggers the open-world event which can allow or pvp or not. But everyone can see what's going on and leave players to feel powerless to get involved. Or its a forced pvp trigger by which players can get involved and everyone can see the pvp while its happening.

Tannim222 wrote:

One thing we want to put in is a faction / repulation system which even civilians will play a part. Attacking civilians in a given area may fall under perview of a particular gang (good or bad - yes there can be "good" gangs too) and that faction could take exception to someone messing around on their turf.
I do like the concept of escalated events based on actions of the player as this gives the game more of a "live" aspect. Random chance of escalation based on location and any nearby factions. Since this is something of a modern / post modern city, everyone having access to the internet in the palms of their hands should make it easy to provide a "reason" for sudden escalation. Why did the cop show up after I first attacked this guy today but yesterday I took mugged 4 people before anything happend?
Weighting the random chance of occurance based on faction / rep standing. If your character is publically known "infamous" for violent acts / attacks on civilian targets, reknown bank robber, etc...the escalation may skip steps. Instead of going: Beat Cop > Squad > SWAT > National Guard >...Your rep upon the random chance triggering the event, place you at SWAT, or higher up (this is all example only).

That was the thought that came to me as I read/skimmed through this thread. The more of a reputation the villain has for harming civilians, the likelier they are to be accosted by the police or the like. Naturally this should vary by zone, as well, such that in some zones the responses are still manageable whereas in others (say, the equivalent of Atlas Park) the villain would occasion a sufficiently severe response that it would discourage most of them from staying. In order to avoid potentially creating a kind of farming situation, I suggest considering having these response units be worth little or no XP and loot.

Such a system would have to present the means to reduce or mitigate such a reputation, perhaps something as simple as having that reputation decay over time. It couldn't be entirely that simple, of course, or someone who couldn't log in for a week or two could be rather irked when they logged back in to their villain.

The whole situation on how a hero could meaningfully intervene to protect civilians has no good answer. Such are the limitations of computer games. I'm not one for PvP and it has always irked me that, in some situations, it's very easy to be flagged for PvP whereas it often requires jumping through hoops to drop the PvP flag (be in an uncontested area for 5+ minutes, etc.). If I'm on a PvE server I want it to be a conscious choice to participate in PvP, not a case of "got too close to that zone, you're now flagged for PvP (/Nelson)".

Last but not least, there needn't be direct parity between heroes and villains in the sense - to put it crudely - that villains beat up 'good' civilians and heroes beat up 'evil' civilians. So long as there is a balance with what there is available to do I, for one, will be content.

Interesting. I kinda like that. You still suffer consequences. Would I, as a villain, be able to walk around with impunity as long as I didn't "do" anything? And then when I did, I would get the high level reaction.

Steve

I want to make sure I understand what you're getting at. On the hero streets, villains will not be able to attack a civilian, but only other attackable npcs. A hero will then never see a villain attack civilians in these locations.

In villain areas, a villain character may attack civilians. these will be special designated civilians for targeting which may or may not be able to get help from some other faction they're associated with, or happen to be an npc hero in disguise. These "civilians" (npc attackable civilians) will be of appropriate level as to not allow any possibility of high level villain pcs go into low level areas, attack a "civillian" and have a gang or something show up to help their friend out and cause problems for low-level players trying to get around.

In co-ed areas, villains may attack civilians only as a means for "role play" to goad hero players into fighting them. There would be nothing else gained, except perhaps enjoyment of pushing a civvie around for a bit.

If so, it kind of gives what some of the players have asked for here. Though I would have liked to see the possiblity of villains causing actual problems which escalated in threat, allowing them to create a self-styled event and gain some notoriety through achievements by winning through various levels of escalation. This would also only allow for PvP in already PvP designated areas instead of a more open-world approach we've discussed in the past. At least not using civilians as a form of trigger.

How about a Toggle with Disclaimer?

Civvies/Thugs are un-attackable under Default standards.
Many games give you a pop up warning when you are about to commit a crime or commit to a PVP action. Hell Aralon the IPhone Open world RPG has it.
So you can select, talk to...etc. but when you use a power against them as a new player - you get a pop up that stops the attack from happening completely and gives you the option to

1. Attack and become flagged for PVP
a. Check box to Never show this again (which just allows/or blocks attacking civvies in the future with no pop up)
2. Cancel attack and close

This eliminates the need for all of the what-ifs if you put the choice into the players hands.
The devs can choose to make the lives of the NPC civilians precious and add the above consequences – PVP + an NPC response when you go overboard.

Tamorand

Personally, I like the ability for villain players to go into the good part of town and actually do bad things in the open world and when on a particular mission. Allowing them to create a disturbance is at least an opportunity to be something more than a flavor of hero if they were only able to attack the same npcs heroes can attack in the "blue" side streets.

If we want players to click on civilians for things other than combat, like getting in-game info and such, a pop-up box excluding this possibility due to the possibility of pvp isn't the way to go. Instead, it would probably have to be a menu option to not show the warning box, so you'll always be able to click on an npc, for either info or attacking.

In the good part of town, I think you could do a instant spawn of police officers (Like the COH events where the MOBs were even level no matter the player level.) with a pop up window telling you the Cops are on their way and if a villain decides to hang around and attack, the Police Violent Powers response team will spawn. Then you should be flagged for PvP if you decide to stay and fight. Thus allowing a villain to grow in Infamy if they win or a hero to gain in Fame if they arrest the villain. Allowing access to PvP centric items, boost, and epic PvP loot. Also, so that way if a villain accidentally shoots a NPC they don't get accidentally flagged for PvP and trounced by a high level Hero camping the area.

I am also very happy with the idea of not being forced into a situation where I have no choice but to PvP...

...Unless I voluntarily walk into a PvP zone, in which case I know exactly what I am getting myself into and, as with CoX, I expect to spend a lot of time chewing on dirt if this happens.

My thoughts on attacking civilians are pretty straightforward, but I'm long-winded and opinionated, so it's going to take awhile to express them.

- There is a lot of talk about killing, and I don't see why that's necessary. Being able to hospitalize civilians is an appropriately villainous act. If someone has the ability to telekinetically lift a civilian up into the air, flies them to the top of the zone, and drops them, well... I just hope the people of Titan City have good health insurance. And that a hero who sees it happening can, without necessarily entering PVP, use their own powers to "catch" the citizen before he hits pavement. No need to directly attack each other. There are hundreds to thousands of examples of heroes and villains "duking it out" without ever laying a hand on each other. From throwing trains full of civilians to just having them trapped somewhere that a hero has to get them out of, there are plenty of ways for heroes and villains to compete without any danger to each other.

- I think there should be zones where attacking civilians as a villain should have no consequences. These are the bad parts of town, where a heroic presence is rare and the police tend to get beaten up just like the civilians (though they can at least put up a fight). Maybe these are the starting Villain zones, maybe they're not, but I think it would be great if places like that exist. You want to play Telekinesis Pong with civilians, or possibly Civilian Tennis? This is where you go.

- I think there should be zones where the civilians are hideously well protected. These will be the good parts of town, maybe the heroic starting areas, maybe not, but as a rule only NPC thugs should be pounding on/mugging civilians. And villains who try to hang out here are probably going to get swarmed by NPC heroes and/or guardian droids who are going to be very, very difficult to deal with.

- I also think there should be PvP zones where, if you go in as a villain intending to cause a ruckus, you should expect that there will be PC heroes intending to protect the people you're trying to harm. In places like this, I would expect that if there is a low population of heroes, NPC heroes can show up. And if there is a low population of villains, NPC villains can show up. This way nobody is bored. I don't know how someone could get bored throwing civilians around like tennis balls, but it could happen. Then again, I enjoyed the idea of Hellion Bowling in Atlas Park (level 50 Energy Blast + knockback set = win)

I think there are a lot of options here, and I think it will be interesting to see how things are implemented, but it should be possible to have something that is awesome for everybody.

Shattered

Um, can I just point out that randomly killing civilians on the street is what terrorists do and we shouldn't encourage that?

Fireheart

Blue Raptor wrote:

I am afraid if heroes and villains (or shades of gray) are allowed in the same area, there are only two options:
1) PCs become PvP-attackable when they do certain things in the zone.
2) You have to accept that someone can do something right next to you and you can not directly intervene. (like in DCUO e.g.)

I also believe that this is the crux of it. Either any such system will allow limited to no involvement or response by heroes, or it will have to be restricted to PvP zones (which is likely nonsensical, since people don't generally go to PvP zones to beat on NPCs). A limited approach, such as knocking civilians about and destroying things, like a spruced up bank heist mission (although not necessarily instanced), might be the best option if such a feature is included.

Darth Fez wrote:

On a not entirely unrelated note, I thought it could be amusing for villain bases to have some mooks which the villain, if he so chose, could smack around a bit. ("Renfield, you idiot!")

Ohhh yes! I loved walking around to NPCs on redside and using /emote smack on them, barking idiotic things.
"Tie your shoes, worm!"
"Chin up, stomach in!"
"I SAID DECAF, YOU SPINELESS, DISGUSTING, CRETIN!"

Felderburg wrote:

Fireheart wrote:
Um, can I just point out that randomly killing civilians on the street is what terrorists do and we shouldn't encourage that?
Fireheart

There's a lot of things that villains do that shouldn't be encouraged. Poisoning orphans, stealing money from banks, assisting a megalomaniac taking over the world are all things that happened in City of Heroes, that players did. I think it is readily apparent to people that play villains, in CoH or CoT, that what they are doing is make believe, and not to be emulated in the real world.

*spit takes* WHAT?! What do you mean? My entire existence, the countless hearts I've struck fear into, they all are make believe? No.. this cannot be!

And now, let me break character for but a moment. As a villain roleplayer, I do acknowledge that, as best put by a certain Merc with a Mouth, "It's all pretendy funtime games". I also believe that allowing villainous acts within a game do not influence the players into thinking that such things are OK in reality. Many of us prefer not to be the goody-two-shoes character that most games force you into and we'd like to go against that ideal as far as we can without getting into truly gruesome things. And even though the games always punish us for this, making everything come our way and try to down us, we still press on for the pure fun it is.

Also, while I despise most things about it, DCUO has a great way for civilian encounters with villains and heroes. There will be very low level ones being mugged or beaten on and the hero can stop this by whomping the criminal (or a criminal breaking into homes, buildings, looting ATMs, so on and so forth.. very minor crimes) for a quick, small XP and currency gain. Villains can also do the reverse and replace the role of these criminals (mugging civs and such) or also whomp on specially marked civs for the same small gain. Some missions even include messing with civs in order to complete, like turning them into demons or spirits and such. *shrug* I personally like this system.

charlieranger wrote:

Besides the occasional need to go slap around some civvies because you had a bad day at work, why would my lvl 50+ arch villain of super awesome badness bother with mugging/attacking some old lady on the street for her $20 and some hard candies? I mean, I guess, sure, why not, but doing some RP in my head leads me to more grand and nefarious deeds.

I had thoughts along a similar line.

Ultimately it is a little unthematic to see villains attacking, or especially killing, civilians. That's generally in the realm of gang members, thugs, and other riffraff. The real villains will certainly threaten civilians (hostages and whatnot) and slap them around a bit in the pursuit of a larger goal. They'll even kill civvies in some grand gesture, typically far removed or off-screen ("Oh my god, that build blew up! There must have been at least two people in there!" "And a puppy!" "OH MY GOD!") Walking down the street and punching random pedestrians through plate glass windows and throwing them into traffic? Not so much.

In summary, I suggest that the better approach is "villains causing chaos" rather than specifically targeting civilians. (A game mechanic that is designed to allow people to assault civilians might also create problems with the 'Teen' rating the game is shooting (I made a funny!) for.)

Awww.. I though maybe a Villans WANTED level would go up, GTA like, and police NPC's would come to arrest him/her. If the villain gains a certain Wanted level, Heroes can Que up and join the police to fight the Villain(s).

Does this mean that heroes or Villains can regain control of a heighbourhood? 30/70. Hmmm... so... what if Villains (scheming little buggers), got together, unbeknownst to the heroes, focused their efforts only in certain neighbourhoods and in certain zones? Ohhh Noessszzzz! :O

Ultimately I think random (or frequent) attacks on civilians can be ruled out due to it being a self-correcting problem. First of all, Titan City is also the villains' home. One doesn't poop on one's own rug, and all that. If some nihilistic "fire it up" type comes along, no doubt more than a few villains would consider it in their own best interest to put a muzzle on that individual. Second, targeting civilians is likely the number one method to become public enemy number one. No doubt there will always be some particularly dim bulb, now and then, who thinks that's an awesome way to make a name for themselves in the world at large. Right up to the point when they realize that they now have literally thousands of heroes looking for them. After all, as Fireheart has pointed out, specifically targeting the civilian population is an act of terrorism. The world took a dim view of that even before certain aircraft were flown into certain buildings.

In summary, I'll reiterate my earlier point: seeing villains attack civilians for the sake of attacking civilians is unthematic.