Guarding the town

[DeletedUser]

Perhaps this is a value we should leave up to the discretion of the devs?

The 100$ cap is a very good point, thus my bringing up itemization earlier.

Too low a percentage to intercept, means doing the job is pointless.
Too high, and it will penalize the duelers.

That said, I belive duelerse with certain builds could doubble as decent guards when they are not actively antagonizing the rival towns.

So, our main concern is itemization and it's impact on said formula atm, right?
Can anyone think of a way this feature could be abused?

 

[DeletedUser1105]

You are both right.

The actual figures will be for the developers to work out (We can't do it all, can we?).

 

[DeletedUser]

Yeah, the level disparity thing between the guard & would-be dueler. Town A is continually dueling the players of Town B. Town B manages to attract a high-level soldier to guard the town. Town A figures this out, and starts only sending low-level duelers so that even if intercepted, the soldier can't duel instead of the intended target.

My suggestion would be that on a successful intercept where no duel is possible due to level disparities the would-be dueler is sent packing back to his home town and can't re-enter the target town for 24 hours. The would-be dueler looses the energy, but not the motivation.

The alternative would be to have the guard acting as the target in any duel and level disparities wouldn't apply. The rationale for this would be that the would-be dueler rides into town, looking for his target. However, he runs into the town guard first and shoots him instead rather than the town guard challenging him.

I would also suggest that on a successful intercept where the guard wins the duel, the would-be dueler is ejected from the town and can't return for 24 hours (wanted notices pinned up around town warning townsfolk about the dueler). I know that duelers will complain about this, but there should be some penalty to the dueler for running foul of the town guard. It's not as harsh as being put into jail for 48 hours, as has been suggested elsewhere, he can ride off to another town and try there instead.

 

[DeletedUser]

Those 24 hour ejections are in now way acceptable.

Only thing that can be acceptable is that the guard would disregard level diffrences upon intercept, but this would hardly be fair, nor balanced.

Overall Sammie, your proposal cripples the duelers, wich is not the intention of my original proposal.

 

[DeletedUser1105]

Yeah, the level disparity thing between the guard & would-be dueler. Town A is continually dueling the players of Town B. Town B manages to attract a high-level soldier to guard the town. Town A figures this out, and starts only sending low-level duelers so that even if intercepted, the soldier can't duel instead of the intended target.

If you can co-ordinate that strategy, then fair play to the duellers. If you want to cover more levels, get more people to guard the town.

My suggestion would be that on a successful intercept where no duel is possible due to level disparities the would-be dueler is sent packing back to his home town and can't re-enter the target town for 24 hours. The would-be dueler looses the energy, but not the motivation.

If you can get the dullers to agree to this, it will be a miricle. I think this would be highly unfair. All you'd have to do is post a newbie character on as the guard. Get the points needed to do the job, but don't go duelling so your level is low. No dueller would ever get through that.

The alternative would be to have the guard acting as the target in any duel and level disparities wouldn't apply. The rationale for this would be that the would-be dueler rides into town, looking for his target. However, he runs into the town guard first and shoots him instead rather than the town guard challenging him.

Level disparities are there for a reason. If I'm a small time guard, and some big time dueller comes to town, he'll knock me out in one swoop. I think it is fair that if the dueller is outside of the normal rules of duelling, then the intercept cannot happen. It would also need more coding to change this.

I would also suggest that on a successful intercept where the guard wins the duel, the would-be dueler is ejected from the town and can't return for 24 hours (wanted notices pinned up around town warning townsfolk about the dueler). I know that duelers will complain about this, but there should be some penalty to the dueler for running foul of the town guard. It's not as harsh as being put into jail for 48 hours, as has been suggested elsewhere, he can ride off to another town and try there instead.

It is an interesting idea, definately. I think it would need more coding than is neccessary though. I also think 24 hours is way too long. The current one hour rule would suffice to begin with (extended to protect the intended victim for an hour too), and then if this was implemented, raise this as an additional idea.

 

[DeletedUser]

I think it is safe to conclude that such additions could discussed after the guarding in itself has been implemented. It's just a bit premature imo, that's all.

 

[DeletedUser]

Correct ! We are just guessing as to the in game 'truth' of Our numbers , and a Mean 50% ratio is our goal . There would be extremes to either side , but on average the "Guard" would intercept 50% and 50% would get past .
24 hours is to much , the stated 1 hour is acceptable to both sides . It's a lot better than the nothing that is there now .

 

[DeletedUser]

Please explain to me why it is fair for a successful intercept where no duel can take place due to level disparities between the dueler and the guard that the original duel still happens. An intercept is an intercept in the guard job - there should still be some protection applying to the town. Perhaps if the guard is the higher dueling level, the dueler is ejected for 24 hours (or whatever). If the guard is the lower level, the dueler is ejected for 1 hour.

Either way, on a successful intercept, the original duel should not take place unless the dueler succeeds in knocking out the guard - it is, after all, the rationale behind this suggestion.

 

[DeletedUser1105]

That;s the point sammie. There is no successful intercept if the duelling levels don't add up.

I assume the game mechanics would make this the first check. If the duelling levels matched, then it would go down the calculations of percentages and such to see if there was an intercept.

The original duel still happens because there was no intercept. If you wish to cover all bases, you would have to put more guards of different levels on post.

The idea of this, sammie, is not to STOP duellers getting in your town and duelling you, but to give the town SOME protection from it.

It would be fair then. I think you are in danger of trying to push this idea over the other side into being unfair for duellers, when we are aiming for a delicate balance between everyone.

 

[DeletedUser]

This idea is supposed to be fair, and balanced.

Both parties will have to find something that is acceptable, but yet does not make them completely happy, it's called a compromise.

There are some stuff I like in this, and some I don't, when considering it from the perspective of my soldier (wich is quite active with the dueling).

Overall I find our current proposal fair and balanced.
It also seems to have few angles that can be abused.

As the evil monkey points out, you are trying to tug this idea in a direction it was not intended.

 

[DeletedUser]

The logic of the proposal seems to be checking for intercept first, then checking dueling levels, not the other way round:

The Interception
The more labour points you have, the higher chance the guard has of intercepting a duel , at a rating of 1% per excess labor point .
The skill 'Hiding' will reduce the chance of being intercepted. Each skill point in hiding would reduce the chance of interception by 5% .
DUELLER A comes to town, queues up a duel against WORKER A. The normal duelling procedure follows. However, in the background, it works out (using GUARD A's percentage of interception after taking off DUELLER A's hiding deduction) if he get's intercepted. If the duelling levels do not correspond with the limits already imposed in the game, then there is no chance of interception. Then one of two things happen:
1) DUELLER A is not intercepted. The intended duel with WORKER A goes ahead as normal. The normal motivation and energy cost is spent. OR:
2) DUELLER A is intercepted. In effect the guard has instigated a duel with the dueller. This costs the guard the usual duel motivation and energy but does not cost the dueller any. Then one of two things happen again: The duel happens instantly, the dueller does not have the option to cancel.
2a) GUARD A wins the duel. The defeated DUELLER A is unable to attack either GUARD A or WORKER A within the next hour. He is free to attack other members as usual.
2b) DUELLER A wins the duel. He gains the usual XP and any money (if the guard is silly enough to have some on him). He then duels WORKER A in the usual manner with a ten minute delay as normal. This duel costs him NO motivation and energy and is played as usual. He has the option to cancel this duel if s/he wishes

Do you see what I am saying? I'm not saying no to all duels or trying to totally choke off duelers, but to make this a workable proposition you need to think about how this job will be seen from the guard's perspective. If you've got a level 10 wet-behind-the-ears dueler, and he comes to town to try and get experience (and money) off the town's level 20 workers, then why can't the level 25 soldier who is patrolling the town run them off if he spots them? It's what the town is paying him to do, after all. I'm not saying that there has to be a duel willy-nilly, but there should be a duel with the guard instead of the challenged party regardless of level disparities.

Maybe what there should be is a dialogue for the dueler: "You have been spotted by the town guard [insert player link]. To get to your original target, you must knock him out first. Do you wish to challenge him or have a quiet drink in the saloon before leaving town? [Challenge Rival] [Leave Town]"

That makes it a bit more tactical - the dueler will have to choose his target carefully in the first place, balancing the possibility that the high level soldier hanging around town is actually on guard duty not sleeping or going after a town with no soldier about...

The other possibility to to make it that the guard job allows the guard to only protect a certain number of players - for every 10 labour points, he can protect 1 townsman. Either way, I suspect that the guard town job will have to wait for the sheriff to be implemented; until we know how that is going to work, I doubt that anything will be done.

 

[DeletedUser1105]

I can change the order of the text if you wish, it was just the way I typed it. I meant for the duelling level to be checked first, as it is now (therefore making less work).

But then low level duellers will be very hard pressed to find ANYONE to duel. How do you expect them to level up when they have to travel across the whole continent to find a duel?

I understand what you are saying, and it IS more logical for the guard to challenge anybody. But then again, it is more logical for anyone to be able to challenge anyone, but it's not like that on the game. I think it would involve a lot less work for the developers if they used the existing rules for duelling levels.

 

[DeletedUser]

I do agree on the logic about guards chasing off lower leveled duesl, but this prestents the problems sdjx22 points out, and thus I belive this must be sacrificed int he name of balance and game mechanics.

 

[DeletedUser]

The way I see it is that there is this heavily armed uber-guard. Sure he'll try and see off a big dueller but he doesn't waste his time chasing off a little punk with a clay jug, he lets the local youths do that. This also means that low level soldiers have a real purpose.
Sammie i think you are trying to fix something that isn't bust here.

 

[DeletedUser]

I like the way you look at that Ulthor.

Why should the big man gun down the brat with a pebble anyways?

 

[DeletedUser]

Maybe, but it still isn't going to fix the problem of duelers consistently dueling those perceived as easy targets - i.e. non-duelers several dueling levels lower than themselves. That's how this entire issue has blown up - once that is fixed, I think a lot of the fuss about dueling will die down.

Frankly, without a counter-balancing mechanism in the game to encourage duelers to go after those that can give them a challenge - perhaps by lower experience, higher motivation loss if you challenge a lower level player and vice versa if you challenge a higher level player I don't see this being anything other than a temporary stop-gap.

 

[DeletedUser]

This can serve as such a counter-meassure.

If the tough guard kicks his ass, he will loose out on the easy cash and xp from his intended target, at the same time he will suffer injury and will be closer to getting knocked out.

 

[DeletedUser]

Can we just get over the idea that duelers should just fight each other and leave other players alone. It's not going to happen, nor should it.

 

[DeletedUser]

No, because until something is implemented that addresses this problem, it's going to be continually complained about. It's not even duelers vs non-duelers, it's level disparity in general in dueling. Duelers vs non-duelers just happen to be the most visible portion of this problem. Challengers that stick to dueling above their level I (and I think most people) have no issue with; it's the bottom-feeders that consistently challenge players many levels below theirs that need some kind of in-game balance.

Guarding the town is a step in the right direction, but it's not going far enough to address the fundamental problems in the dueling system. I would be more than happy with something like I suggested earlier that reduced XP and increased motivation (preferably on a non-linear scale) for the number of levels below your level you're dueling (and vice versa for dueling above your level).

Let's face it; what people are complaining about is lawlessness in general. The bottom-feeders aren't duelers - they're bandits pure and simple.

 

[DeletedUser]

Groan....

This idea is a very good solution to a certain aspect of this problem. If you are just going to highjack it with unreasonable demands then there is no way forward.

People are bending over backwards to try and see each other's point of view here and you just want an effective roadblock to duelling. The minutiae of your arguments have been repeated many times on previous topics and I refer you to such moribund posts if you want to go over tired old ground. Your points have been refuted to too great a length to bear repeating.

As for the moral judgement you are putting forward, it's just embarrassing now. This is a game, please treat it as such.