Reputation wish lists

I thought I would start another thread for reputation ideas. It helps to get a set of views before features get started (The Middle States feature set is firm, but there is always the future) And it is nice to get a chance to air theoretical ideas and see how they might get turned into code.

The current Middle States reputation system is really simple. If you deliberately shoot up another ship, that faction goes hostile. Forever.

The intention (aside from simplicity) is to change the way pirating happens. Basically, each faction will let you have one surprise attack. After that one attack, all escort ships will attack on sight. Pirating will become very dangerous. I expect Lpoints to change from easy pickings into nightmare combat zones, with hostile ships arriving non-stop.

A player will need longer range sensors, just to hover on the edge of stations waiting for prey. Pirating should become much more underworld like.

There are so many directions to take reputation, it is really hard to know how to move forward. It totally depends on the kind of game that you want to build

We were discussing ship boarding. And basically, it really boils down to convincing the crew to hand over the ship without blowing it up. And to do this, they need to know they have a better chance of living if they give up the ship. One interesting idea was to implement a “ruthlessness� reputation. You gain ruthlessness by destroying ships, especially civilians. The height would be killing civilian stations. If you have a high value of ruthlessness, then you can threaten, and people will listen. But they will never trust you. So you will always have to fight to the bitter end. They will always self destruct the ship.

The other extreme is “honorable�. This person never kills if possible. Always lets ships flee from combat. And never would blow up innocent civilians to achieve a goal. This person has a harder time making credible threats. They tend to have to start combat, but almost never has to finish it. People are willing to surrender. Just a thought on how such concepts as honor could make it into a freeform game.

We were also discussing having factions limit the kinds of orders that player wingmen would take. One idea is that a player can Join a faction. Once inside, they must keep in strict accord with the faction’s wishes. Only attack some factions. Leave others alone. Never attack allies. The player has access to the faction’s resources. And has the chance to assist the faction’s goals. This is kind of the opposite end of the scale from a Freelancer type game. But the player can have the chance to see life from the eyes of a well equipped, but very restricted Navy Officer, or Police Ship Captain.

Ok, this thread is already long. But the idea of each ship being a unique individual with a relationship is pretty cool. I don’t think it is possible with a cluster the size of the Middle States. Basically, each ship would need to be an object that was saved and restored. The ships would be stations. This could be done. But there would need to be many less ships. The Middle States release has some ship to ship communication code that allows the player to open a dialog with special ships. This kind of feature could be widened to include all ships. And add requests for help or offers to travel together, or whatever.

Make a reputation, but instead of insta hostility, make it gradual, and decayble, meaning, if you made them angry but then leave them alone for a long period of time, they eventually go neutral.
Bribes would tip the scales in your favor, accessible via stations.

General faction tension, if faction a is warring with faction b, and you kill a lot of ships of faction b, faction a will like you more, kinda GTA 2 style.

I'm in for sensor system redo, shorter range for low lvl sensors, and passive sensors should only detect a contact, not which type (is it in EoC, I haven't noticed) with ranges shortened.

Ruthlesness sounds good, would be nice to have some pay off for letting this and that transporter go after dropping cargo.

That was the Freelancer system, and it worked pretty well. But I didn't notice that it changed my behavior much. The goal with this system is to make piracy feel like piracy, dangerous and criminal. If you choose to become a pirate, expect to live like one. On the fringe. Shunned in every civilized place you have made an enemy.

Some factions make a point of remembering hostile and doing a good job of transmitting information, like the police. For them, it is really a matter of recognizing a hostile ship.

One extension of that thinking is to attach an "infamy" value to a players ship. If the ship has been doing a bunch of piracy, it is quickly recognized. If it has not been doing much, it takes longer for the police to spot you. This might work to make criminal endevors more stressful. You can still approach legal stations to trade and refule, but it will be a matter of time before you are spotted. Those moments of wondering if you will get away with it this time - that might enhance the criminal feeling all the more.